Burning Paper Tigers: The Outsider II
by F6F Freak
Summary: The sequel to my other TwoKinds fanfiction, The Outsider, based 1500 years into the future. Thanks to Tom Fishbach, creator of the original TwoKinds, because he is awesome. My first attempt at crafting a truly global-scale novel.
1. Chapter I

Well, folks, I decided to make a sequel to The Outsider. I got an idea for it and I couldn't let it go. Hopefully, this one will be shorter than the first, simply because I really spent a lot of time on The Outsider. Really, this story is based less on the world Tom Fishbach (the original creator of TwoKinds, who is an awesome artist and author) created, and more on the ripple effect from Curt Lane's arrival into that world. If you haven't read The Outsider, do so before reading Burning Paper Tigers (It's in the same section on here); I don't do much in the way of explaining events in the original work here, simply because it is free and there's no reason you shouldn't be able to read both. I tried to make a balance of romance and action, but I'm not so sure how I did.

Useful, well-rounded feedback is always welcomed and thank you in advance. Also, it is worth noting that the uploader is doing something funny with italics, where it removed the spaces. I think I fixed all errors, but ignore any I missed.

As always, I hope you enjoy!

* * *

><p>General Joseph Lane CXLVI stepped off the back of his dragon. The two Unity Nation escort <em>hubschrauber<em> gunships landed beside it while he and his staff dismounted. The gunships were standard Lane Industries _Kobra __Hubschrauber__. _The dragon was trimmed with gold armor and ceremonious fittings. Dragons had ceased to be United Species Alliance (USA) combat platforms in 1943, when modern _Überschall__-_jets and _hubschrauber _began to exceed their performance. Joe's Grandfather, President Curtis Lane CXLIV, had ensured that dragons were still used in the military so as not to hurt their stubborn pride any more than necessary. They were still used in ceremonies and by royalty. While generals usually didn't rely on them, Joe wanted to rehonor the largely _dis_honored and disregarded magical creatures at least in some small way.

Joe sighed and made his way into the United Basidian Forces' main base. The guards at the front door stiffened to attention and saluted as he and his staff made their way through. He walked through the maze of corridors designed to deter the intruders that would never come and down to the meeting room. His staff went to a waiting area. Assembled in the room was the Board of Generals. The meeting began a few minutes after his arrival; mundane things were covered. Replacing aging _panzer_ units, upgrading critical military and civilian infrastructure that was going on 100 years old, and, of course, the ongoing debate on replacing manna crystals with some form of more renewable energy.

As usual, Joe didn't pay much attention to the debate - industrial manna would last for a very long time, not counting the more refined but less concentrated manna in the ground. Also as usual, the Basidian generals didn't pay much attention either. Their people couldn't use the stuff, so what did they have to worry about? Plenty, Joe knew. Their machines still ran off manna crystals, their armor piercing rounds were still tipped with manna, even if they didn't use magic. They still didn't have as much to worry about as the Humans and Keidrans (not that Joe thought the Humans and Keidrans had much to worry about in the first place), but when everyone else started hurting, they would too.

Joe didn't much understand why the BoG discussed the topic - it was something better left to the president and his cabinet or the congress. It was an issue that would eventually confront the USA as a whole, not just her military. Joe remembered his brother, the current president of the USA, talking about it, too. So, if people over his head were debating it, why were he and his comrades? _Bureaucracy__, _he thought with scorn and dismay.

Finally, the meeting moved on to the current state of security in the USA. "Nothing has changed from our last meeting, gentlemen," the Basidian consulate reported with certainty.

Joe's patience had honestly expired. "Nor will it by the next meeting," he said aloud, and more bluntly than he'd intended.

The other generals looked at him in shock.

He leaned forward in his seat, knitting his somewhat furry fingers fingers and leaning over the conference table. "Honestly tell me that you believe it will," he said. "We're nothing but a shell, gentlemen! None of us have ever commanded a real army. The last war fought on this world was five hundred years ago, as the Human Republic was united. The only thing we know about war is what the textbooks and military exercisers tell us. Why are we even still here? We no longer debate military matters. Look at us! Everything up until this conversation could have been handled by the Congress, or the President's Cabinet!"

"He's right," the Wolf General said. "Why _are_we still here? There is no need for a military now. A stronger police force could do the job as well as we could while costing our governments half the money."

The other Generals looked at the Unity Nation and Wolf Generals in shock while trying to come up with a response.

Finally, the Basidian spoke up, "You two seem to forget the Basidian People's Republic, not a hundred kilometers from here, and the Mask Worshiping Republic of the Arctic Wolves."

Both were formal titles for the only two nations not part of the USA. They posed minimal threats to the massive USA. Joe chuckled and shook his head, feeling his Fox-like ears sway with the motion. "The Arctics pose no threat. They have no industry to speak of, no motor vehicles, no armor, no civilized weapons, heck, they don't even have a cavalry!"

The wolf delegate nodded, "The Western Basidians" - the less formal title for the Basidians not in the USA - "pose more of a threat, possessing motor vehicles and modern light arms, but their most advanced units are armored dragons, who don't even have the benefit of magically strengthened armoring. They are situated across a mountain range and an ocean from any USA territory. More importantly, they are in the middle of a severe economic depression and they refuse our help to recover from it. They cannot wage a war when their economy is so devastated. They're no real threat."

"They would be without a military of some form," the Fox General astutely observed.

Joe nodded, "What we need gentlemen, is a rethink. A full military is no longer necessary, but we still need to protect our peoples."

"Are you proposing some kind of defense force, General Lane?" the Dog General asked.

"I suppose I am," Joe said with a shrug. "We're all aware of the economic depression each of our nations is slowly sinking into. We could cut out billions of dollars of spending by reducing our militaries to only what is necessary. Pump that back into the economy..." he trailed off, allowing his argument to sink in.

"But how many jobs is the military providing?" the Basidian General asked.

"More in your nation than in any of ours," the Wolf General said, laughing toothily.

The Basidian didn't let any possible insult show. "Not just in the service itself," he said, "but also in manufacturing and support roles. The military is also a vital part of _all_our economies."

While Joe had to give that argument pause for thought, he was confident he was right in the long term and thus kept the discussion alive until the end of the meeting.

* * *

><p>Scythe, King of The United Wolf Clan, looked to his High General in shock. "So, General Nari, you are proposing that, for the first time in <em>eons<em>, we _cut_ our military?"

"Yes... Yessir, that is what I am saying. But I have good reasons and motivation."

"So you've said," Scythe said, standing up from his throne and walking over to a bullet and manna proofed glass window. Outside were angry Wolves protesting in the streets. "Now, however, is not a good time. Are you aware that our stock market has just collapsed?"

General Nari looked rather stunned. "No... No, sir... How bad is it?"

"Bad enough. Four hundred companies, mostly small businesses, have gone out of business. I don't even want to name how many are almost there. Suicides are off the chart... It's... Not going to end well."

"I'd say not, sir," Nari murmured. "Should I bring the military in to bring these riots under control? It doesn't look like the police are going to be able to handle this one very well."

"I thought the police was all we needed?"

"The plan involved strengthening the police, if you recall, and I await my orders," the General seethed.

"Yes, _panzers__, _ armored personnel carriers_, __hubschrauber__. _Try to disperse them from around the palace."

"Yessir," Nari said, bowed and walked out of the room.

* * *

><p>Wolf High General Nari shook his head. The king was ordering the use of <em>panzers<em>_, _APCs and _hubschrauber _to defend the palace and get the riots under control. That meant that they were far worse than Nari had anticipated. The General had traveled to the palace via the same network of underground tunnels he was currently traveling through to get to the command center from the palace, thus avoiding the riots and leaving him blind to the trouble. He sighed.

He walked into the Wolf Joint Armed Forces Command (WJAFC) and started spitting orders.

"Armor and _hubschrauber__? _Why?" his next in command asked after he finished giving his commands.

Military units were usually referred to in German; the only documents which contained German were from the Great Lane; the only of his kind, a man thrown from a distant and dying world; the first of his lineage. Those documents contained a modern word bank, with words for things that didn't exist in Human and Keidran, like _panzers _and _hubschrauber_. So, instead of making new words, inventors generally used the German term. It worked, though it ended up making for an interesting mixed vocabulary for those involved with matters military. APCs had a term for them in Human, as did jets. _Überschall__, __hubschrauber__, __lazers_ and _panzers__? _Not so much. "That is what His Majesty requested. I am not one to argue with him."

"Relaying orders to our motorpool and air bases now."

The Great Lane had done his best to end war in the first century. He'd done a good job of it, too. While he hadn't lived to see the fall of the Vast Human Empire, The Great Curtis Lane had been instrumental in bringing about it's collapse. When the Human Empire collapsed, his descendants carved territory-running from the Southern Coast north to the Azure Badlands, east from the Great Western Mountains to the Great Eastern. The nation was called the Lane Republic. Soon, decedents of a certain Flora and Trace Legacy moved into the newly formed nation. It was renamed the Unity Nation-unity of the Lanes and Legacies, unity of the species and, soon, unity of the nations.

In the year 1000, the Unity Nation started conferences to form the United Species Alliance, which, 1004 years later, was still around. Unity Nation had denied hosting the USA meetings, which left them to the only piece of ground that every nation refused to claim-_Lyn__'__knol__. _1004 years later, _Lyn__'__knol_ was still, more or less, the capital of the world. The current year, 2004, on the other hand, hadn't been a very influential year, or at least, Nari didn't think so. Really, 1516, the re-unification and formation of the Human Republic, was the last year of any significance. More correctly, 1518, the year the HR joined the USA, was the last year of any significance. All the years after-all of Nari's years included-had been rather mundane in the whole scope of things. _Granted__, __riots__-__especially __of __this __scale__- __are __pretty __interesting__, _he thought as he made his way up to the roof of the WJAFC.

Taking out a pair of binoculars, he examined the surrounding city. The riots were indeed very violent, encompassing most of the palace grounds and a good deal of the financial district, along with spilling over onto adjacent districts. _It__'__s __going__ to__ be __bloody __murder __getting __these __under __control__, _he thought with a look at a perfect formation of riot police failing to take control over much of anything. He didn't care to think about the fact that it might literally become bloody murder and thus ignored the metaphor. Motorcars and lorries were burned in the streets, windows broken, electronics stolen. Anywhere there were riots, there wasn't much left of the city.

He turned his glance to the motorpool, where _panzers _and APCs were rolling out in two fast-moving columns. _Hubschrauber _took off from _hubschrauberlandeplatz_ deep in the heart of the base, near the runways.

_This__ should __be__ interesting__, _Nari thought as he watched the armor close in on the rioting crowds.

* * *

><p>Wolf Army Captain Juniper looked around the APC she commanded. It closed in on the rioters in the capital city. She sighed with a look at the massive riot, covering more ground than she could see. She sighed again and added "This should be interesting," to her crewmates. Her APC was the leader of its column, which meant that it would probably receive a lot of hits and pelting from the rioters. That was fine. The machine was made to withstand hits from Manna Crystal Tipped (MCT) rounds. Rocks wouldn't hurt it. <em>Me<em>_, __on__ the__ other __hand__, _she thought with a sigh, _they __can __hurt_. She wanted to sink back down into the turret and button the hatch, but knew better. One couldn't see half as good through periscopes and viewing slits as was possible when outside the hatch. If that meant that she took a few pebbles on the goggles and helmet, well, she could handle that.

The APC closed in on the edge of the crowd, which came out to meet it and the _panzer _that headed the other column. It wasn't long before rocks were thrown, pelting the outsides of the small infantry-carrying vehicles and larger armored gun platforms.

Juniper pressed the button that put her microphone on the speakers outside the APC. "Cease this action or you will be fired upon with nonlethal rounds," she called.

"Speak for yourselves, you paper tigers!" one loud protester called, "It's too late to make demands, you've got a riot on your hands!"

Juniper grimaced, switching her mic feed back to the internal feed and making a simple command, "Fire."

There was no response from her gunner other than the low thump of tear gas grenades being fired deep into the crowd and the rattling of the machine's two 15mm _maschinengewehre _firing beanbag rounds at the closer civilians. The _panzer_beside her vehicle launched tear gas grenades and kept lumbering on at its slow pace. Thankfully, the rioters seemed to know better than getting close to it; doing so would likely result in their being crushed undertread. They hadn't been so wise with her vehicle, but they weren't stupid enough to say in front of it after her gunners opened up. _Hubschrauber _flew over the motor columns, their rotors beating the sky. They stopped and hovered over the city center, dropping tear gas and magical canisters, though Juniper wasn't quite sure what spell they were using. Neither did she know nor did she care; that wasn't her job.

Unfortunately, what was her job was about to get more difficult. She'd expected to see pebbles and stones fly her way. The blue bolt that streaked over her head was not a pebble. With that thought, she closed the cupola's hatch. She was very thankful she did when a bolt smacked into her primary view port and was dispersed by the protective spell on the APC's armor. She shivered when she thought what would have happened had she not closed the copula. "Gunner, do you have that idiot?"

"No, whoever it is is is somewhat deep in the crowd."

She cursed as she checked her computer ordinance readout. "Fire off those last two teargas grenades, try to fire after those bolts," she ordered. The teargas grenades were launched out of small canisters on the side of the _maschinengewehre _turret, meaning they could match a trajectory. Maybe. She heard two low thumps over the constant din of the _maschinengewehre__._

A voice came, crystal clear, over the comm stone in her helmet.. "Column halt," came the order from the colonel in the _panzer _to the right of her APC.

"Driver, all halt," she relayed to her crew. The vehicle stopped.

"_Panzers_ are to move around to the palace and create a perimeter. APCs, we will have to pass in front of you, stay halted. Once we are clear, deploy your men and group into pairs of vehicles. Try and disperse the crowd as much as you can. Make sure the men stick to you."

"You got that, sergeant?" she asked the leader of her APC's squadron, who was also patched into the group's comm stone feed.

"Roger. Wilco."

The _panzer _column passed in front of her slowly. As the final tank clanked by, she ordered "Alright sergeant, out with you."

"And a good day to you, too, ma'am," he chuckled with sarcasm, snidely commenting on her usual blunt manner.

"Hush up, James. Do your job," she laughed with a roll of her eyes.

She heard clanking as the rear ramp lowered and the infantrymen and women filled out. There was another clank as the door was closed automatically. "Driver, ahead full." She switched over to the feed for her entire column, "spread out, groups of two, you heard the colonel."

There was a chorus of 'Yessums' and 'yessirs.' Her men and women still couldn't decide whether to tell her yes sir or to use the seemingly less leader-like yes ma'am. It didn't bother her; she actually thought it was rather funny. The driver started moving forward. Another APC formed on her right flank, its squadron grouped around it, hiding behind magically reinforced riot shields. Her squadron was doing the same. "Driver, take us toward the financial district. Let's see what we can do there."

"Roger, wilco."

"And, gunner, save our ammo."

The _maschinengewehre_ ceased their constant rattle, instead settling for short bursts at civilians in support of the squadron surrounding the vehicle. Juniper nodded in approval. She had a very good gunner. Actually, she had a very good crew in general, she thought as the two APCs rolled into the financial district, a _hubschrauber _hovering towards the end of the street. She noticed rioters throwing things at the rotary craft, bottles, bricks, rocks; nothing that could really do any damage to a high-flying _hubschrauber__. _However, soon blue bolts and lashes, some tipped with dragon's heads and teeth, were flying towards the hovering craft. One such well-aimed dragon-lash spell grabbed hold of the _hubschrauber__'__s _tail and bit it off. _This__ won__'__t __end __well__, _Juniper thought with a grimace.

The _hubschrauber_ began to spin wildly out of control, heading down rapidly. The crowd that had previously refused to disperse now did so with alarming speed. The _hubschrauber__'__s_ rotors met asphalt and splintered, flying off into the crowd with devastating effects.

The comm stone was again filled with the colonel's voice, "All commanders, I've just got a message from His Majesty himself. Use of deadly force is now authorized. Please relay to your crew. APCs relay to your squadrons. Be prepared for the aftershocks of using deadly force. The gods be with you."

Juniper cursed quietly to herself. "Crew and squadron, use of deadly force is now authorized. I repeat, deadly force is authorized by the king's order." She switched back to the normal internal feed, "Driver, take me to the crash site as fast as you can."

She could hear the gasps over the intercom and comm stone. They hadn't expected to hear the order for deadly force. This was supposed to be riot control, not war. But... The _hubschrauber _that had been taken down was the command... Which meant that one of the king's closest friends was either dead or on his way there.

The driver kept the vehicle moving at a pretty fast clip, making her squadron have some trouble keeping up with it.

"Ma'am?" her gunner asked in a trembling voice, well aware of the power he now had, "Should I begin to fire?"

"No, hold off as long as you can, at least until we get the crash site secured," she said after a slight pause for thought. "Use beanbags as long as they hold them off. Eventually, they won't."

"Yess'um."

She hated it when she was right. Sometimes, especially with a kind as tough as the Wolf, when people got mad and determined enough, nothing short of death would stop them, make them listen. Nothing. Fortunately, the crowd was still hesitant to near the crash. The two APCs formed beside the crash while their squadrons went into the wreckage. "Sergent, how bad is it?"

"Pilot's barely here. Co-pilot's dead. Four passengers, all barely conscious. Let down the ramp, these people need to be evacuated."

"Got it. Driver" - who had the ramp controls - "Let the ramp down so we can take the injured crew in. We've got to get them back to base and now."

There was no response, but she heard the ramp lower.

"APC-2, sergeant, can you handle this until support arrives? Two _panzers _and two additional APCs are on their way, if my HUD reads properly."

"We're good," the sergeant reported.

"We can hold out," the commander of the second APC reported. "Get those men to care. Thegodsspeed."

The ramp clanked and the driver began to move forward without asking for her order. That was just fine with her. "Driver, full speed, don't mind the crowd, if we run somebody over, it's their own fault. Gunner, do try to keep us from running anybody over with however many beanbag rounds you have left."

"Roger."

"Wilco."

As the APC flew down the city streets at near a hundred KPH, Juniper thought that the road was bumpier than normal. Had the riots damaged the streets that badly? Or were the eight wheels bumping over something more... disgusting and sinister? She decided that she was better off not knowing.

* * *

><p>The chairs were thrown and tables toppled, their hands armed with broken bottles, but they weren't running, "We're not running!" Axe called. They were cornered by riot police and APCs in a small pub. All they had were broken bottles, barstools, Lane Cocktails and whatever magic the men and women crammed into the pub knew.<p>

"Not running!" they called back.

Axe grinned, raising a fist into the air and pooling manna into it from a crystal in his pocket. He pushed the blue energy out of the fist and towards the riot police's feet. There was an explosion and an upwelling of ground. "We can win this fight!" he yelled. And they would.

A Lane Cocktail, its rag flaming, flew out above the crowd of riot police and crashed into the top of an APC. The crew started bailing immediately as the flames grew. A lash of manna from Axe's hands cut them down, one by one. The mob started charging outward, swarming over the policemen. An APC opened up with it's dual _maschinengewehre_. _Bean bag __rounds__, _Axe thought.

But they weren't. The crowd was cut down, blood was spilled and bowels burst. Axe dove for the ground, the lethal rounds barely missing him. He breathed heavily and listened as the remaining APC and policemen went away. He slowly stood up, shedding silent tears for those fallen. His fists were clenched. His teeth showed. "I will avenge you. I will," he snarled. "If I have to take on the whole world, I _will_ make up for this injustice," he growled. He let out a howl. The howl of a hunter.

* * *

><p>This USA BoG meeting was much more interesting than the previous meeting had been, or at least, that's what Joe thought. Then again, half of Wolf nation going into riots made for a pretty interesting situation to discuss. What made for an even more interesting discussion was the formation of a rebel Wolf army under a certain former construction worker named Axe. Thus far, it was small, but the potential for it to change the entire scope of world politics was... massive. If the USA lost one of its most significant players to rebellion and anarchy, it could upset the balance of world power severely. If that anarchic state managed to establish a stable government that decided not to join the USA, it would create a severe danger for every power anywhere close to it - Unity Nation included. <em>Actually<em>_, _Joe thought with a mental cringe, _the__ Wolves __have__ atomic __missiles__... __Every __nation__ on __the __planet __is __vulnerable__._

That had been covered, of course, but there was nothing any of the other powers could do about it; the Wolf general stubbornly refused to turn his nation's missiles over, even temporarily. That presented a problem if the rioters ever got a hold on the missiles. Atomic weapons, which split the atoms of manna crystals, created a chain reaction that turned into an explosion that could destroy entire cities or armies. That was not the kind of power that needed to be in the hands of anarchists, much less an organized anti-USA government. Unless the board, congress or the president himself could get the Wolves to turn the missiles over, there was only one way the situation could end, and that was to say, badly.

Joe really didn't want to see how the situation would end, because he got the feeling, as prideful a people as the Wolf were, the situation was going to end badly. Very badly. The Wolf general shook him out of his thoughts, "We need assistance getting these riots under control! Send anything you have, we beg of you."

General Lane cut several other generals off with five sharp words, "Hand over the missiles first."

"We refuse to! If you provide us extra forces, there will be no need for us to hand over the missiles," Wolf General Nari replied flatly.

"General, have you ever heard the old adage, 'better safe than sorry?' I do believe this to be one of those cases," the Basidian General said in a flat voice, yet still managing to make the statement very pointed.

The Wolf let out an exasperated snarl. "Don't you see? I'm not allowed to negotiate! King Scythe has told me that we _will __not _turn the missiles over. We need help if we are to prevent the world from going seriously downhill!"

Joe let out a smaller snarl of his own, "Don't _you _see? If you don't negotiate, there's no way _to_ prevent the world from going downhill. There's only two ways this situation is going to end, general, and neither of them are too good. One is, however, significantly better."

The Wolf let out a low, seething growl. "Gentlemen, _we __are __not __diplomats__. _I am not here to negotiate. You want us to turn over the missiles, go to the king himself. I _am__ not _the one for you to aim your sharp words at."

Joe had to fight to keep the Tiger and Fox in him from bubbling up into another snarl. "Very well, then, General, I'll do that," he said and begun to get up from the table.

"General Lane, where are you going? You are not dismissed."

"Wolf country, general, Wolf country."

* * *

><p>USA President Trace Lane looked at his brother in slight bewilderment. "You flew to the Wolf palace to talk to King Scythe himself, just like that?"<p>

"Yeah, just like that."

Trace refrained from laughing as he sunk back into his chair, his Foxlike ears standing up in anticipation for Joe's answer to Trace's next question, "And how'd that go?"

Joe's own Foxlike ears drooped as he grimaced. "Ehh... Not so well."

Trace could no longer restrain his laughter.

"It ain't _that _funny!"

Trace brought the laughter under control, "Perhaps not. It's close, though."

"How do you figure?"

"Well, you're _too _used to bureaucracy. The Wolves have one leader, their king. Once he's made his mind up, it's final. There is no one who can sway him from his decision, no one who can argue with him. I never thought I'd see my brother, the great military man, too used to bureaucracy. I thought that was why you joined the military instead of going into politics?"

"As it turns out, brother, you can't escape the mess, no matter where you go."

Trace had to grimace that time, "There you're most certainly right, Joe."

"I'm painfully aware."

Trace shrugged, "Just another day in the world we live."

"I beg to differ," Joe said. "It's not just another day. _Revolution _is not typical of our world. It's not like it's _just_ another war. War is not common here, brother, not any more."

The President of the USA sighed, "I suppose you're right there, too." He made a gesture to Joe's UN military uniform, "I reckon people in your profession are about to start earning their pay."

Joe shook his head, letting out a deep breath, "Yeah, I reckon so. I never thought I'd see a war. Never. Just yesterday, I was suggesting reducing our military, because it's useless, a shell."

Trace eyed his brother with careful criticism. "It is no longer useless. It may become essential shortly. A shell?" He sighed, "I fear it still is. No one in our military-now save the Wolves-has fought a war in their lives. You included."

Joe shrugged, "Now _that__'__s _just another day in the world we live."

Trace had to nod solemnly and checked his watch. "Well, I do believe that it's time for us to go for what you're here for."

"It is," Joe agreed, motioning for his brother to precede him. There was a screening of the new movie, _The__ Great __Lanes__, _scheduled for the president and his staff, friends, and family. Joe was all three.

It was only the umpteenth movie made about the great Curtis Lane, but it was the first major production about him in twenty years. Film making had come a long way in that time and a lot of history about the original story had been uncovered. The film was supposed to be very accurate and also entertaining. The story of Curt and Michaela had became a classic nearly instantly, having a great and unlikely love story with a lot of action and twists and turns. It appealed to all audiences.

The movie started showing a beautiful Fox slave, actually famous actor Lauren Legacy, who was a Unity, escaping from the bonds of her master, a slave trader and drunkard. Lauren looked like a full-blooded Fox with a bit of makeup and she was certainly beautiful enough for the part of the famous (and famously beautiful) Michaela Lane.

Human actor James Earl Jones played Curt. He was very tall, even for modern times, making him tower over all the other actors and properly portray a man from modern times flung to ancient ones. He was also a good actor, portraying the part well.

The scene shifted from Curt looking around confusedly after emerging from the collapsed gate to his world to Michaela running full speed through the woods of the western UN... or, Human Empire.

It wasn't long before the two star actors collided in brilliant fashion. Curt held her to the ground by the wrists, looking at her in bewilderment. "What are you?" he asked distantly.

She laughed, "Like you don't know!"

"What are you?" he demanded, "I'm not kidding!"

"You really don't know, do you?" she said with shock-Lauren Legacy was indeed a good actress. "I'm a Keidran, you know, that race your people hunt down and enslave?"

Curt, or the actor portraying him, murmured silently to himself. Trace figured that the words would have been curses had the producers not wanted to keep the movie open to all audiences. "Well, then, Keidran, what's the hurry?" he asked as the Fox fought his grip.

She sighed, "I suppose you'd find out, anyway, but I'm running from my master. His control spell failed."

"Magic?" Curt muttered.

Michaela raised an eyebrow.

Curt rolled his eyes and sighed, "If I let you go, will you go running off?"

"No," she said, voice trembling.

He nodded and stood up, helping her stand as he did so.

Trace heard someone come into the theater, and walk behind him, over to his his brother. He looked over to see a plain clothes guard speaking into Joe's ear. Joe was nodding, then, suddenly, his movement froze and his face lit up. He looked over to Trace and motioned. They both got up and left silently.

"What is it?" He asked as they automatically made their way to the situation room in the bunker of the mansion.

"The Wolf rebel army has acquired advanced ground and air dragons from the Western Basidians," Joe answered flatly with a grimace. "They reinforced the composite armor with magic. They're giving _panzers_ and jets a run for their money."

"The machines are still superior, right?"

"In the hands of well-trained pilots and commanders. Rookies? Not so much," Joe said with a grimace.

"What else do you know?"

"Nothing. That's why we're headed to the command center, unless I'm mistaken."

Trace nodded with a sigh.

They burst into the command center _"__Was __ist __das __Problem__?" _Joe demanded in loud German. Military men were usually fluent in German.

The Tiger, Cat and Basidian generals looked at him in confusion. _Or__, __at __least__, __most __do__, __anyhow__, _Trace thought and translated, "What's the problem?"

"The Wolf Rebel Army now has armor and aircraft, essentially. They're advanced armored dragons."

"How old are the dragons?"

"Some are ex-Templar, others were used by Lane Industries, the United Keidran, Eastern Basidians... They're all combat experienced."

"Whereas the Wolf pilots have no experience," Joe muttered and turned to Trace, "You've _got_ to find a diplomatic solution. I'm doing the best I can."

Trace nodded and hurried out of the room to his office. Joe was right. If he didn't find a diplomatic solution, force would be the only solution, and with every passing day, force grew to be a worse solution. _But __a __diplomatic__ solution__, _he thought with a grimace, _ain__'__t __happenin__'._

* * *

><p>Axe looked over the map. The Army was holding down the capital sternly. There was no way they were taking it with brute force. Terror teams, saboteurs and spies were, however, working hard within the city. The mountains on the border with the Human Republic and Unity Nation where well under Rebel Army control. Axe's top generals were leading <em>blitzkriegs <em>towards key points all over the Wolf Kingdom. Ground Dragons weren't optimal against _panzers__, _but they were holding their own pretty well, simply because the dragons knew what they were doing. The _panzer _commanders? They'd never fought a real battle.

The dragons in the air were having a much harder time, the jets they were competing against able to fire beyond line of sight and going upwards of three times their speed. Biggest problem was, jets were expendable. Dragons? Not so much. _However__, _Axe thought, _it__'__s__ not __as __big __a__ problem __as __it __seems__. __Dragons __want __action__, __they__ want __to _do _something__! __They__'__ve __been __inactive __for __a__ thousand __something__ years__._ When put that way, Axe would want to do something, _anything__, _should he be in the same situation. And that was how he'd secured advanced armor and experienced dragons from the Western Basidians. And how glad he was that he had. His ragtag army was holding its own against trained professional soldiers. That was remarkable. _And __I__'__ve __done __it__, _he thought. _Me__, __a__ no__-__account __construction__ worker__. __I__ created __a __revolution__!_

He had, too. Ever since he and a small group had walked out of that pub alive, he'd became a leader of increasing numbers of people. As it turned out, there were a lot of people fed up with the monarchy. The collapse of the stock market and the military's use of brute force to control the riots had been the breaking point.

Axe shrugged and sat his glasses on the desk with a gentle toss. It was time to call it a day in the mountain hideout. He stood up, his forming staff opening the door and filing out. Operators and officers stayed, and would do so around the clock. Running a war was an around-the-clock business. _But__ one__ man__, __one__ leader__, __can__ only__ do__ so__ much__, _he thought. He walked out of the command building and some distance down the mountain to the house he'd had built for he and his wife.

He opened the door slowly, sneaking in on his paws. His wife turned from her place in front of the stove to face him, grinning, "Not today."

"Oh, no?"

She shook her head as they wrapped in a hug, "Nope."

"Then what?"

"This," she said and let their snouts meet in a kiss. It lasted for some time, a perfectly somber and honest embrace.

When the broke, he shrugged, "Well, that's pretty good too," and grinned a-very-toothy grin.

"It had better be," she said in a mock threat.

"Excuse me, ma'am, but you're talking to an important Wolf now," he returned in the same mocking tone.

"Important enough to be prideful and vain, I see," she said with a sheepish grin.

He shrugged, "If you want to put it so hurtfully, honey."

She rolled her eyes, "Just sit down and eat your food."

"Oh, now that, I have no trouble doing," he said, smiling, as hie made his way to the table.

"Good thing, too, I worked hard on this venison stew."

His mouth full, he managed to mutter, "Well, you did good."

She grinned toothily-even for a wolf-as she ate.

They didn't speak for the duration of the meal-as good a cook as she was, they rarely did, they were too busy stuffing their faces. In wolf country, it was a compliment. That didn't meant that, when they finished, he didn't compliment her. "Thank you, dear," he smiled. "As usual, it was delicious."

She nodded, "I do my best with what little you can get up here."

"Is that a complaint I hear?"

"It is!" she exclaimed. "Don't you see it? We've got nothing here, we're hiding and running. We can't get anything we need; that venison was hunted down by one of your men. We should be able to go to the market and get all the food we want!"

Axe shook his head. "You seem to forget the fact that nowhere in Wolf Territory is there a real, open market. Wolf Rebel Army or no, the country is in riots. I'm just putting some order to them."

She sighed, "Yeah, I guess so. It's just... Not... Not right, not normal, to me."

He sighed, too. "It'll get better. It will be better. That's why I did this, for us, for you and all of us, as peo..." His small speech was interrupted by a short kiss from his wife. "What was that for?" he asked as they broke.

"You talk too much. I understand. I don't like it, but I understand. I think it's better when you don't talk."

He grinned. "Really now? I can do better than kissing, you know."

* * *

><p>General Lane looked at the USA BoG. The Wolf General was halfway through a speech begging for armed support form the other USA nations. "...you do not pledge support to His Majesty, the riots-and now the Wolf Rebel Army-will consume our nation. Worse for you, they will also find our atomic missiles. We cannot allow this to happen."<p>

"Turn your missiles over to the USA and you will have full cooperation from the United Basidian Forces."

"The Fox pledge their support with the same conditions."

"Same for the Dog."

"Same for the Tiger."

"Same for the Fox."

"Unity Nation pledges two infantry and one armored division, as well as one air wing."

The other generals stared at him in shock. "I am by no means complaining, General Lane, but why are you breaking from the other generals?" Wolf General Nari asked.

"If we end up fighting a war, I want my men to be able to fight-to know what war is really like. I wish I could commit more men, but it took some doing to get what little I did."

"I am thankful for it, general. The entire Wolf Nation is thankful. When can we expect to see these men?"

"Air strikes are en route. The ground forces are being assembled in the rally point nearest to the border. We will coordinate together at a later date. Now, I imagine, the BoG has things it thinks more important?"

"General Lane, with this action, Unity Nation is violating USA protocols."

"And?"

"You could be removed from the alliance."

Joe laughed a chuckle that turned into a most evil-sounding cackle. "Good. That would free up all our forces to crush the Wolf rebels. Besides, you won't boot us out of the alliance anytime soon. You seem to forget that Lane Industries, based in the UN, supplies, what, seventy percent of the alliances' weapons? You can't remove us, it would hurt y'all far worse than it'd hurt us, and you know it."

The Dog general sighed, "He's right."

"Eighty," the Bastian general said.

"What?" the Dog asked.

"Eighty percent. Lane Industries supplies eighty percent of the USA's military hardware."

* * *

><p>"So, you're telling me that you <em>lost <em>our general?" the Major screamed at the assembled airmen and technicians.

"Sir!" Technical Sergeant Amber Finney replied, "It was not our fault."

"And how is that, sergeant?" the Major said, getting right into her face.

"There was a tremor, a small earthquake, it distorted the portal's shape and changed the plane of the event horizon. It made the wormhole go somewhere else."

The Major relaxed a bit. "Where?"

"We're not sure. Instead of making a portal across space-to other locations-it made a portal _through_ space-to another space, an alternative universe, if you will."

"We need to get our General back."

"I've handpicked and am prepared to lead a team through to rescue our man," she replied.

The Major nodded, "That's more like it. You're cleared. Get ready."

Amber and her squadron scrambled to the ready rooms and prepared for the mission ahead of them. Ten minutes later, they assembled in the portal chamber.

The sergeant didn't even brief her squadron. They knew what they were doing, where they were going. They knew their mission. There was no great, grand plan, just stay alive, grad the general, get out.

An automated computer announced the charging of the portal coils as technicians, Sergeant Finney included, imputed new parameters into the computer and changed the portal's destination to match where the error had sent General Lane.

That done, she stood as the portal formed and the airmen of her small team ran through. She charged after them, across the plank and through the blue. The additional distance between the two portals was perceivable. But she soon stepped off of the metal and onto grass with a sigh. Her squadron fanned out, making sure the area was secure. She surveyed the scene and realized that a granite monument with a walkway full of people staring at her and her men stood in the middle of the large clearing amongst giant trees in which they stood. About 400 yards away was a parking lot full of automobiles of a manufacture and form Amber didn't recognize. _We__'__re __here__, __alright__, _she thought.

That's when she realized that the people we're human, but had ears and tails, some like foxes, others dogs, cats, wolves, tigers. Some were completely covered in fur, others with skin everywhere but their ears and tails. They were all staring. _This __should__ be__ good__, _she thought. "Lower your weapons," she said quietly to her men. Loudly, she called, "Do you speak English?"

One, in a uniform not to far removed from her own, stepped out of the crowd. "We speak Human, yes. Who are you?"

Shouldn't they have been shocked by the portal? Scared by the number of weapons they held, their sudden appearance? "We are from the United States Air Force. We had a man come here by accident, we are looking for him."

"USAF?" The man-like thing asked.

"Yes."

"Are you actors?"

"No, why?" she said cautiously, her gun still half-raised.

"What's the name of the man you're missing?"

"Lane."

"Major General Curtis Lane?"

Amber's eyes shot open. "Yes! How did you know?" her form tensed. All her mens' did. If they knew exactly who he was, they might hold General Lane.

The humanoid let out a startled-sounding laugh. "You're about 1500 years late." He started walking toward them. He met with Sergeant Finney and stuck out a hand. "Sergeant Kelly Youngston-Lane, Unity Nation Air Force. Just call me Kelly."

She shook it. "Sergeant Amber Finney, United States Air Force."

"General Lane never could quite believe that no rescue parties were sent after him. I guess I know why now. Follow me, sergeant, you'll want to see this," he said, motioning her and her men towards the granite monument. "Read this," he said once they had arrived.

On the base of the monument was an inscription, **"****LANDING ****PLACE**** OF**** THE**** GREAT**** CURTIS ****LANE****, ****SAVIOR ****OF**** OUR ****WORLD****."**

Amber's mouth dropped. "What did he do?"

Kelly shrugged, "Invented democracy, modern warfare, brought us out of medieval times... I could go on for quite some time."

She looked to her first in command, a Sergeant Powell. "Well, sergeant, radio back home, they'll want to hear about this one."

He nodded, "Yes ma'am," and stepped away from the group, speaking into his walkie and radioing through the portal. The portal collapsed shortly thereafter and he returned to the group. "Command wants us to stay a while, see what we can figure out about the General, what he did here."

"Please tell me that they checked to make sure they can re-open the portal before they closed it," she said flatly.

"They did. Our trajectory was confirmed and tracked precisely, unlike General Lane's. We guessed to get here."

She nodded, "Just so long as we can get home."

Kelly returned her attention to him, "Well, what can I do for you?"

Amber was a little taken aback. He was very kind and helpful. "Let's start with your name. Are you related to him?"

"Nearly everyone naturally born into this nation is related to Curtis Lane. That's why my surname is 'Youngston-Lane.' Since almost everyone had the same surname, we started using secondary surnames, clan names, some call them. Direct decedents or high-ranking men of significance use only Lane or Legacy."

Amber nodded. "Almost everyone in this nation? Lane or... Legacy?"

Kelly nodded. "We are a people called the Unity. We are Humans mixed with Keidran. Only two occurrences of successful cross-breeding ever occurred. One was between Curt and his future wife, a Fox Keidran named Michaela. The other between an important Templar named Trace Legacy and his future wife, a Tiger Keidran named Flora. There are few other surnames, as few other humans came into the nation."

Amber paused in thought. "Looks like we have a lot to catch up on. How do you know so much about General Lane?"

"Well, that was elementary school history, but my unit guards this memorial, so we have to know. All of my men are... almost... equally knowledgeable."

"Then I guess we came to the right place," Amber said as she shouldered her long gun.

One of Kelly's eyebrows raised in what was clearly curiosity. "Is that the same kind of gun the General carried? They're worth a pretty penny if so."

"Our pistols are. He shouldn't've carried a long gun," Powell responded.

"Trust me, he did," Kelly said, causing Amber and Powell's eyebrows to raise. "He said he carried it because he still sought revenge for his wife's death. 'A poor decision I'm glad I made,' were his words."

"Why don't you take us to your commander, Sergeant Youngston-Lane?"

"If you want to refer to me by my rank, stop at my clan name, and follow me."

* * *

><p>General Lane raised binoculars to his face, watching his <em>panzers<em> tangle with Basidian made WRA Ground Dragons. Jets zipped over his head, firing missiles onto the battlefield. Infantrymen were crouched behind the _panzers__, _waiting to come close enough to the Ground Dragons or enemy infantry to do some damage. _Maschinengewehre_ mounted on both the WRA MGDs and UN _panzers _rattled away, punctuated by the booms of cannons on both. He could see the magical shields on both take the impacts very well. Nonetheless, a well-placed shot toppled a MGD somewhere on the far right of the front. In the middle, a _panzer_ brewed up, earning a grimace from Joe.

"Where is our air support?" he asked as a second _panzer_, to the left, went up in flames.

"Tied up in a dogfight," his Air Force commander, a Samuel Winchester-Legacy responded.

"Then get us more. We have more aircraft that what're tied up in that."

"All other aircraft in the air wing we've secured are on the ground refueling or getting repairs."

Joe thought for a second. "Well, we decided to devote one air wing. Less than one air wing is in the air. See where I'm going with this?"

Sam grinned, his Wolf-like features making the grin very devious indeed. "I do," he said and made his way to the radioman. Minutes later, _Überschall _jets shot overhead, dropping cluster bombs and JADAM guided ordnance onto the enemy formations. Large groups of MGDs were closing in on his left flank. There were enough that they stood a good chance of winning over the thinly spread UN _panzers__._ Joe turned around and walked to the circle of tables that composed his mountaintop command center. He stood over the communications table and tapped a communication stone that connected him with Wolf General Nari on the other side of the plain. "General, now would be an opportune time."

"Roger. Package is on its way."

Joe moved back to the edge of the mountain to see two giant Wolf Nation jet cargo transports swoop in miles from the right flank and level out a few hundred meters over the battlefield, their rear cargo bay doors open. Boxes dropped from the open doors, separating into halves and revealing massive arrow-shaped bombs. They dropped rapidly to the ground and detonated four feet above the ground. Red and orange rapidly radiated out, shooting out and up, along the ground and up. A shockwave shot out, sweeping WRA infantry off their feet and flinging them away. The waves reached the enemy armor, toppling them and burning them.

Brave Wolves and dragons got up to their feet again, and got back to fighting. His UN forces crushed the disoriented rebel fighters. The second bomb, which had dropped in the heart of the flanking enemy forces, had decimated the flanking maneuver. The _panzers _of the first UN armored division charged forward after retreating WRA forces. His infantry fanned out and eliminated fleeing infantry with precision.

"Let the rest run," he shouted to his radioman, how relayed his order to the forces that then halted.

"Well done, sir," General Winchester said with a pat on his back.

"We got lucky," Joe said with a grimace. "The Rebels already know how to fight. If we wouldn't have had those MOABs, we would have lost, and I am certain of it. Either way, make sure your fighters pound any of their supply lines they can find."

He nodded and went to his own radioman. Joe went to his, "Make sure they get as much of the field as they can. I want this front to move as fast as it can. If this war drags on, we _will _lose."

The shockwaves and sound from the two massive bombs hit them just then. Joe was nearly knocked off his feet, tents were blown, papers thrown far away. The sound was deafening, a thunderous, deep, growling boom reaching deep inside him.

"General Lane?" a younger boy called from behind him, ignoring the massive blast.

He turned to see a young airman. "Yes?"

"I've got some people you'll want to see."

"Who?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you, sir, honest."

"Not much can faze me, son. My brother is the most important man in the world," Joe said, being sure not to seem enthused; he wasn't.

"Not anymore, sir."


	2. Chapter II

Alright, y'all, today's author's note is going to be rather lengthy because I'm going to address some concerns I've gotten in my feedback. The thing I've seen consistently is that this story no longer reads like a TwoKinds story. I suppose I made the similarities too in-between the lines.

The original TwoKinds is a racial commentary, as Tom was the victim of some racism when he decided to start writing it. While I won't deny that racism is still around and that it is a very evil beast, I will say that I believe it a thing of the past-something that is going away. However, as Egypt and Lybia are presently demonstrating, the present struggle of two kinds is the struggle of the oppressor and the oppressed. You'll see that the Wolves and their struggle are demonstrating this. There are very distinctly two kinds here; the upper-class, snooty King Scythe who refuses to change his mind and whose wife and subordinates fear him, and, in contrast, the blue-collar and flexible Axe, who refuses to be called sir or take a rank, and who comes home to face his loyal yet questioning wife every night.

However, the story will get more like the TwoKinds you are familiar with shortly - Amber and her team are there for a reason. Until then, it is a TwoKinds story in spirit, if not in letter.

That said, here's the second chapter of Burning Paper Tigers, hope you enjoy!

* * *

><p>Amber and her squadron were sat at a table in a tent on top of a mountain. That was all she honestly knew about where she was, too. She'd been told the name of the mountain, but it wasn't familiar to her, and thus meant nothing to her. She'd been told where it was at, too. That meant nothing to her, either, she found. What she did know was that the supreme commander of Unity Nation's forces was in the encampment. That, thankfully, did mean something. So, she and her men waited for him to come.<p>

"Alright, who are you and what do you want?" she heard a voice call as it's owner burst through the tent's door. "You know, I'm a very bus... By the gods..." He trailed off as he saw the squadron.

Amber stood up and saluted, "Technical Sergeant Finney, United States Air Force."

"Grand General Joseph Lane, Unity Nation Armed Forces," he said, returning an identical salute, his ears up and alert, sticking up from his hat.

They stared at each other blankly for some time, neither quite sure what to say. Amber finally spoke up, "We were sent to find General Curtis Joesph Lane. I understand that we're a bit late?"

General Lane laughed, "By a good bit. But... Still. Your arrival is... Big."

Amber shook her head, "I do not see how. We aren't General Lane. We'll probably just head home now, after we gather a bit of intel on him; what he did, that sort of thing."

"No!" General Lane exclaimed. "Now that you can come and go as you please, we can do trade, be allies, something. The Great Lane is an icon to us, almost a god among men. Our people will do anything to know people who knew him, the world that raised him."

Amber made a surprisingly horse-like snort. "Our world is dead, in ruins. We don't have much to trade."

"I'm aware," the general said. "You have knowledge to trade. We have land. Unspoiled land."

Amber nodded. "I can't speak for my commanders, but I'm sure we'll have a deal in no time."

* * *

><p>Captain Juniper looked out of her APC and examined the battlefield. The panzers and ground dragons were already tangling. She and a column of APCs charged towards the flank of the enemy dragons, hoping to take out the infantry who were hiding behind the dragons' armor with their <em>maschinengewehre<em>_. _"Gunner, at the ready," she ordered rather preemptively, not wanting to be taken off guard.

"Always, ma'am," he replied.

She grinned. She had a good crew, indeed. She spied panzers with typical WA markings coming in to her right, from the direction of the enemy lines, but far right of their flank. _Odd__, _she thought, _though __I__'__ll __take __all __the __help __I__ can __get__._

That's when the panzers opened up. They weren't firing at the enemy's flanks. They were firing at her column. "What the-" she heard a commander somewhere behind her say before he was cut off by his APC going up in flames. The two panzers escorting her column broke off, charging towards the enemies and firing. Juniper automatically closed the commander's copula over her head.

"Gunner, arm and fire AP missiles at will. Make them count." Each APC was armed with four Anti-Panzer wire-guided missiles. _Good __thing__, __too__, _Amber thought with a grimace.

"Roger that."

Juniper saw the turret traverse to the right. the first of the AT missiles went off and shot towards its target, hitting the lead enemy panzer just under the turret. The panzer brewed up in no time. Several enemies, which had been focused on the two tougher and more dangerous escort panzers_, _turned their turrets on her APCs. "Gunner! Prioritize targets focused on our column!"

"Done," he said as another missile shot off. The driver's hatch was threw open on the panzer he targeted, the driver throwing his hand forward. The missile suddenly stopped midair and stayed frozen.

"Gunner, _maschinengewehre __auf__, __dass __fahrer__! __Jetzt__!" _she shouted, barely noticing that she had continued in German past the word for which there was no equal in Keidran. It was fortunate that her driver was as fluent in German as she was. Many military men and women were, for sheer necessity if nothing else.

The turret moved a bit before she here the distinctive rattling of the twin _maschinengewehre__. _The bullets stayed hung in the air, likely in the same field the missile was stuck in. But the gunner kept hounding away. Juniper set her optics to magnify her view and soon realized why; each successive bullet was making a crack in the magical shield the rebel wolf had put up. After another second, the shield shattered in dramatic fashion, suddenly becoming visible in the form of blue shards splintering and falling to the ground. The bullets, now unstuck, flew into the driver's chest. The missile made it's way just above the glacis plate on the enemy armored vehicle and bored in, exploding. The commander and gunner bailed from the panzer as it brewed up. _Maschinengewehre_ cut them down before they could flee.

"Well done, gunner. Keep up the good work!"

There was no response save the swerving of the turret at another panzer.

"Base, this is Captain Juniper, we need air support, if you haven't already heard. We've got APCs and two..." -she grimaced when she realized that one WA panzer was in flames- "...make that one, panzer_, _going up against an enemy panzer column."

"Captain, confirm, enemy panzers_?"_

"_Panzers__," _she said with some emphasis.

"Roger. Air support is inbound."

She refocused on the situation to see three more enemy panzers in flames, along with five of her armored vehicles. "All vehicles, fighting retreat. I repeat, begin fighting retreat. Full speed."

The driver threw the APC into reverse, gunning the throttle. He made sure to keep the most armored section of the machine-namely the front- facing the enemy. Even in reverse, the eight wheeled APCs could outrun the heavy, lumbering panzers.

Problem was, what the APCs had in speed, they lacked in both armor and armament. All the Anti-Panzer missiles her craft possessed had been used. "Gunner, smoke grenades! Try and conceal us!"

There were four thumps right as she saw the muzzle of a panzer flash. _Gods__! _she thought as she felt and heard the shell slam into the nose of her vehichle. She threw the hatch open and jumped out, running for her life. _Maschinengewehre _bullets hounded off the hull of the decimated APC as her driver and gunner bailed out escape hatches on the back. Fortunately, she hadn't been carrying infantrymen.

Ground attack jets screamed over their heads, firing off several missiles and dropping bombs. They made a return run with cannon, at which point the panzers finally took flight. Likely out of ammo, the jets didn't make a return run. Juniper and her crew, along with many others, piled in the back of one of the few surviving APCs as they made their way back to the base camp.

* * *

><p>"What do you mean, our attack failed?" King Scythe snarled at his generals.<p>

"Sir..." One of the lower generals stuttered.

"Get it out!" he commanded.

The general snarled slightly, "I meant just what I said, sir."

"I will not have that disrespectful tone around me, general. Guards, take him away! Take him to Re-Education! Now, will someone please explain to me how my strategy failed?" he spat and growled.

High General Nari finally spoke up, "The Rebels seem to have acquired panzers from an unknown source. They bore WA markings and were able to get close to the flanking APC column before they opened fire. There was no way they could fight back."

"So nowhere along the line of command did anyone notice that these panzers weren't part of the plan?" the King spat. How was he to win a civil war with such incompetence?

"Not until they opened fire on our units. The field commanders assumed that they were a last minute addition to the plan by the head commanders. The head commanders assumed that they were added by an overzealous field commander."

Scythe growled. "How am I to win a war with this level of incompetence? Purge all the commanders of the operation! Replace them with more competent men!"

"Sir, those were our best commanders. We cannot afford to replace them. Not now."

"If that is our best, I do not want to see our worst!"

None of his generals responded. They were all incompetent, too!

"You want something done right, you gotta do it yourself, ain't that the way it goes?" he growled. "I am assuming direct control of my military."

The generals still cowered in incompetence.

Scythe studied the map. "Here. The reb lines are thin there, right near one of their civilian encampments. Punch through their lines and murder the civilians. That'll teach the fools a lesson!"

* * *

><p>Wolf Queen Naomi waited for her husband to arrive in the dining hall. He finally came through in a huff. <em>Today <em>_is __not __going __to __be __a__ good__ day __for __me__, _Naomi thought with a hidden grimace. If Scythe was mad, he did his best to make her life Hell. She still wasn't sure if he did that on purpose.

"The incompetence I have to deal with will drive a man insane!" he growled as he unceremoniously sat at the head of the table. _I__'__ve__ thought __you __insane__ for __some __time__, _Naomi thought. Her thoughts were the only place she could criticize her oh-so-loving husband, lest she be sent to enjoy Re-Eduaction (through labor). "Enough about me, though," he said, suddenly and instantly calm, "how are my beautiful wife and children?"

"I'm wonderful, dear," Naomi said, smiling a very false smile.

"We're all great, daddy," the kids chorused, smiling the same false smiles.

"I'm very glad," he said, smiling far more warmly than could be true. "Now," he raised his voice, "Where is my dinner?"

Servants, heads all bowed, ran into the room carrying massive trays of food, setting them on the table in just the right spot and dashing off before they could be fussed at for anything they hadn't done according to the wonderful king's all-too-lofty standards.

They all ate eagerly, hoping to get out of the room as quickly as possible. Maybe Scythe wouldn't say anything more before they were able to leave. Maybe.

No such luck. "You know," he said, swallowing however much food he'd greedily lumped into his mouth. "I came up with a new strategy today, took direct control of the army and did it. We're going to attack a thin place in the reb's lines and into one of their civilian encampments! We'll kill their civilians! That'll teach them!"

"Oh, yes, that is a great plan!" Naomi said, "They'll learn not to rebel against the great King Scythe!" _You__ fool__!, _she thought, _That __will__ only __gain__ them __more __support__!_

"Indeed they will, indeed they will," Scythe said with an evil grin.

* * *

><p>"This is <em>not <em>how you wage warfare," First Sergeant Finney said, shaking her head.

"General Finney, this is textbook Lane doctrine. _Your _superior wrote it. Who are you to question it?"

"For the last time, I am not a general," she said, letting just enough anger slip into her voice. "And, these may be perfect textbook tactics, but they are not what you should be using."

"How do you figure?" Joseph Lane asked her flatly.

"These are perfect tactics for busting fortifications; taking out well-established defensive perimeters. That's not what you are doing, not anymore. Those ground dragons are rapid-moving, mobile gun platforms. You need to counter with flexible tactics, like the Rebels are starting to learn."

"You know, I have very well-paid generals that don't know tactics as well as you, sergeant."

Amber shrugged, "I was fighting this kind of war last week. Your generals never have."

The general sighed, "Yeah, I suppose that's the problem with our world. We haven't fought a war in fifteen generations."

She shook her head, "No, trust me when I say that that's a good thing."

General Lane nodded.

"War destroyed our world. Maybe we can stop that from happening here," she said, watching the gruesome scene as Rebel ground dragons wiped up Unity Nation tank (anyone from Unity Nation would have said "panzer") elements.

"Air strike inbound," a runner reported to General Lane.

He nodded, "Good."

"Air strike?" Amber asked.

"All our _panzersoldat_ are dead or on their way to meet the Masks," he responded. "The Rebs don't take prisoners."

Amber looked through digital binoculars and looked at the scene thousands of feet below on the valley floor. She magnified it several hundred times and waited as the computer brought the scene into focus for her. Wolf Keidran scoured the battlefield, wholesale slaughtering Unity tankers, most of whom were too dis-coordinated to fight back. The few that were coordinated enough to made sure that their deaths cost several Wolves theirs. She let the binoculars fall down around her neck and nodded, "I can see. Those _are_ old tactics."

"No," General Lane corrected her sharply. "Those are the tactics of savages. Our men let some of them run if we win a battle. If the Rebels have any say in it, none of our men make it out from a defeat. We've decided that we're going to make the same stand. Their losses cost them a whole lot more than ours do, so we need to level things out a bit."

"What are you saying, general?" Amber asked in confusion.

A runner handed each of them sunglasses.

Amber's mouth fell open in shock. "You're going to nuke them, aren't you?"

"If 'nuke' means to drop an atomic bomb on their savage, overtly-furry _ärsche_, then yes, I intend to."

She suddenly realized the gravity of the situation. The UN was serious about winning this war, even if it wasn't their war. Losing it would mean the loss of the USA's (Amber frequently thought about the irony of this world's acronyms as compared to her world's) almost total control of their world.

Amber heard a rumble over her head and was promptly reminded to put the sunglasses on. As she did so, she saw a large bomb fall through the cloud cover and drop through the clouds. It corrected its path as it fell. _Interesting__, _she thought, _they__ are __using __nuclear __smart __bombs__, __not__ missiles__. _Then again, tactical nuclear bombs weren't really in style on her Earth; strategic nukes were all the rage. On this Earth, it appeared as though they liked to use tactical nukes as though they were going _out_ of style.

There was a blinding flash mostly blocked out by the sunglasses. A shockwave radiated out, decimating everything it touched. Blue fire burst up from the ground and into the sky, slowly turning into a large, very distinct, mushroom cloud that rose up high into the sky. That Amber could see, none of the Rebel forces were left. Suddenly, from under the dirt and ashes, lumps rose up, shaking the dirt off of them, revealing the fact that they were dragons, somehow still alive after being hit with a nuclear blast. They shook their armor off and ran, eventually taking flight, away from the UN lines.

"How did they survive?" Amber asked right as the shockwave and massive noise reached the mountaintop, wiping the final syllables from her mouth and air from her lungs.

General Lane took a deep breath in after the shockwave passed, his ears laid back under his General's cap, and sighed sighed, "You seem to forget that we have more than physical armor here. Magic was shielding those dragons. It may have protected them, but it's gone now and they'll probably be useless in combat for months to come."

Amber raised an eyebrow.

"Our atomic bombs work on a totally different principal than yours do. Your bombs split (or was it fuse?) uranium atoms. Ours split the atoms of manna crystals. They not only explode violently, physically wiping things off the map, but they also wipe all the magic from the area they affect. Dragons being magical creatures…"

"…They wipe out their power," Amber said, connecting the puzzle.

General Lane nodded, "Exactly. That's why the bombs are so effective. And, unlike your bombs, they don't leave behind lots of radioactivity, and not for ages at that. My men—or at least those of them that don't depend on manna—will be charging over that ground within a matter of hours."

"You know," Amber said at barely more than a mutter, "we could probably use some of those in China right about now."

General Lane turned around and started walking into the tent encampment, no doubt to his tent, "Yes, speaking of, how's it going in China? The Great Lane didn't speak of it often in his writings."

"Honestly, not too good. They may not be very organized, but they can afford to lose ten men for every one we can. We've more or less exhausted our nuclear weapons stores and, our factories not being very functional at all, our conventional weapons supplies aren't doing so well, either."

"Our factories happen to be producing far more than we need," Lane said, smiling.

"I think we can make something good of this, general," Amber grinned as they sat down in Lane's tent field office. "What would you want in turn?" Part of Amber's job, a lot for a sergeant, was to negotiate trading for things the United States needed from the Unities. The stories of making associations with another world like theirs had spread through the United States' military very rapidly. Apparently, the President was even on board with a plan to form some sort of alliance with the Unity Nation. Amber was on board with that plan, too.

"Well, for starters, my superiors want the portal technology. That would be a huge help for our military, heck, they've considered putting it to civilian use."

"What you do with it would be your decision," she smiled, "but I think we can give it to you."

General Lane stuck his hand across the table, "I think we have a deal."

Amber shook his hand with gusto.

* * *

><p>Axe's jaw dropped. "They dropped an atomic bomb on our forces?"<p>

His second in command nodded. "And their retreating forces, too."

Axe motioned that aside, "We would have killed them anyway. How many men did we lose?"

"Nearly all of our first armored and infantry divisions. Fortunately, most of the dragons escaped, though they won't be capable of battle for some time; they are too weak."

Axe bowed his head for a moment, holding a moment of silence for the good men and women he'd lost.

"Sir?" his second-in-command broke his concentration.

"Don't call me that, I'm not superior to you," Axe said, looking up.

"Then what do you want me to call you, general?"

"No, I'm not a general, I'm no better than any of you. I'm just an average man fighting for what I think is right. Nothing more, nothing less. We're all brothers," Axe said. That causeed the women in the room, working side-by-side with the men, to glare at him.

"Right," he muttered. "We're comrades. Comrades, that's what we are."

His right hand man nodded and smiled, "I like that. Well, comrade, what are we to do?"

Axe chuckled, "I have no idea." He glanced at his watch, "tell you what, I plan better on a full stomach, let's take a minute to eat and come back.

They all laughed, nodded, and filed out of the room.

Axe, of course, went back to the log cabin he and his wife shared. Whatever she was cooking smelled very good.

"Good news?" she asked, sounding hopeful indeed.

"Couldn't be farther from it," Axe said with a loud sigh.

"What happened?"

He leaned up against a counter near her. "Unity Nation dropped an atomic bomb on us when we won near the the border of the forest."

She gasped, "What are you going to do?"

He shook his head, "Wish I knew. I don't see what we can do. They'll probably start doing that whenever we win against them."

"So we won't be able to afford victory..." she trailed off.

"Exactly. It's actually a genius strategy, as much as I hate to admit it."

"It's savage, is what it is," she said.

"We're no better. Our men don't take prisoners. It's only because we don't have any place to put them, but the fact still remains."

She nodded. "Wait, if we stopped that, couldn't you turn this into a massive PR ploy? Gain more support, get the USA to stop it?"

Axe's eyes shot open, "Yes! That is perfect! We can get a PR victory, if we can't get any other kind!" He kissed her suddenly, "You know what? I love you."

She smiled mischievously, "Is that so?"

He grinned toothily, "Very much so." But he stopped in thought again. "And, we can get more than one PR victory than this."

She raised an eyebrow.

Axe sighed, "One of our insiders, a general for the king, has discovered that the next of the king's plots is to break through our lines and murder civilians. We've been massing troops in the area, but defeat is pretty well imminent. If they slay our civilians, we can get some major PR, new recruits, defectors, the whole nine yards." He grinned toothily, "Oh, yes, I love you, indeed."

* * *

><p>Trace Lane looked at the situation map in the USA Presidential Mansion, along with his brother, UN General Joseph Lane and USAF Sergeant Amber Finney, a soldier from the same world as The Great Lane. Trace had always thought of his brother as a great general, but this sergeant from another world was rather showing him up.<p>

Currently, all three of them grimaced while leaning over the dynamic touchscreen situation map. Sergeant Finney had very rapidly adapted to the new interface, commenting on its ease of use and similarity to ones in the USA she knew. She changed it to the mode where she could draw over the map and made two semicircular marks, one staring from the WA's main encampment and one from the UN's. The two marks met in the middle, neatly slicing the bulk of the WRA units in half.

"You want a broad, general grand plan? This is it. I can't tell you how many times this strategy has been used in our world. It's worked most all of them."

"What can cause it to fail?" Joe asked, stroking his clean-shaven face. For a Unity, a clean-shaven face was actually quite hard to accomplish.

"Well, it relies on you putting a lot of force behind your attack. You have to drive hard and fast to catch the enemy in the pincer. If you run out of steam, it's bound to fail. You also have to maintain strong lines to make sure they don't break out of the pocket. You've got to keep your forces supplied. When you're moving so fast, you'll stretch your supply lines awful thin."

"Sounds complicated," Trace mumbled.

"You want to win a war?" the sergeant asked, "You can forget anything resembling simple tactics. Logistics will get messy, comm lines will be jammed with traffic, there will be confusion and chaos, but you'll get it done. General Lane passed our ranking system down to you, it's very sturdy and redundant; it works well. It's designed so that, even if you don't know what every unit is doing, they do and their superiors do. Your orders will get carried out eventually."

Joe and Trace nodded. "I don't think we can loose with you on our side, sergeant," Trace said with a mischievous grin.

"Don't say that. You'll jinx it," Finney said with a light chuckle.

Joe nodded grimly, "Well, jinx or no, we'll have a hard time doing it. I don't think that the majority of the Wolf Army will be on our side for long. This thing just keeps getting worse."

Trace nodded, changing to shaking his head as he spoke, "Don't matter what I say to the Wolf King, he won't let up. He keeps getting more and more controlling and forcing. I'm honestly starting to wonder who's side we should be on."

Joe shook his head that time, "You haven't seen how these savages fight."

The sergeant nodded thoughtfully, "I have to agree there."

"With your new atomic strategy, are we no better?" Trace asked with a raised eyebrow.

Joe shrugged smugly, "_Nichevo__. _Welcome to war. It's a bloody business."

Finney grimaced, "You have no idea, general. Just trust me on that one."

"I will," Joe said. "Speaking of, I have to wonder when the first of our new APCs, tanks and nuclear bombs will be produced..."

Trace knew that he was speaking of new weapons made from technology the USAF gave the Unity Nation, though he had to ask, "What are tanks and nuclear weapons?"

"Our terms for panzersand atomic bombs, respectively," the sergeant provided.

Trace nodded. "I see you've grown used to the terms of your companion's world," he whispered in Joe's ear.

Joe punched him in the ribs, which, his brother being the soldier that he was, hurt.

Something on Finney's belt beeped. She grabbed it off the belt and looked at what Trace recognized as a cell phone's screen. She grimaced, "I have to go, gentlemen," shook each of their hands and left.

"You know, I keep giving you heck about being single," Trace said, "And I don't see a ring on any of her fingers."

"Not happening," Joe snapped, "Especially not in the middle of a war."

Trace chuckled heartily, "Hey, man, I'm just saying."

"That's also what you said about that pretty little blond in sixth grade. How'd that work out for me?"

Joe's fiance had left him with nothing but his name and the clothes he'd been wearing at the time.

Trace nodded slowly, "I get the feeling that sergeant Finney wouldn't do that to you. She doesn't strike me as the narcissistic kind."

Joe nodded, "True. Let me level with you, Trace, we'll just have to see."

"You're giving it consideration?" Trace asked, rather surprised.

"I might just be," Joe said musingly before refocusing on the situation map.

* * *

><p>Amber rushed through the underground tunnels built under the USA presidential mansion. She came to the room that had been given to the USAF for a portal receiving room. Two airmen guarded the door, but didn't even check her ID as she came in. Inside the room was a table with a laptop and a large antenna array sat on it. The antennas were capable of communicating back to the base, even across the boundaries of the alternative universes. They worked on principles far too complicated for her to understand, much less explain.<p>

Nonetheless, when she put a request and authorization code into the computer, the portal appeared at the end of the room. She stepped through, walking across the black for some seconds before emerging into the Cheyenne Mountain Complex. General Thomas, the base commander, was waiting for her as she stepped off the plank.

"Sergeant Finney, am I correct to understand that your team still cannot locate General Lane?"

"That is correct, sir. Our portal emerged about fifteen hundred years after he did. We cannot seem to change the portal's course enough to match his arrival."

"And why is that?"

"You see, General Lane stepped through the portal in the middle of a small tremor or shift in the ground into which the portal is bored. That means that the portal had only partially warped when he went through the event horizon. Now, it has warped farther and we can't change it back to where it took him."

"You realize that command is not going to be happy about this, right?"

"I'm fully aware, sir, but there is absolutely nothing any of us can do about it. The portal can still carry people to China for our operations there, but, with a change in parameters, it can take us to a whole new world, something that can very much benefit us. As you're aware, we're getting weapons shipments from them in exchange for technology. It's very much a win-win."

"I am aware. I want something more, however."

Amber raised an eyebrow.

The General chuckled. "They have... What do they call them, mages? Yes, that's the correct term. I'd like to see them in expeditionary forces and we'll send more military advisers. I also want you to get to work on getting into an alliance with either Unity Nation or the United Species Alliance. I read the briefings, you know."

Amber nodded and scratched her chin. "I'll talk with General and President Lane immediately."

The general saluted and turned as the coils on the portal began to glow.

Amber sighed and stepped back through the portal, emerging in the room below the USA presidential mansion. "That was quick," she muttered, making her way back to the room she and the two Lanes had been in before she was forced to leave.

"I might just be," she heard General Lane say as she walked in.

"Might just be what?" she asked.

"What? Nothing, nothing," he said awkwardly. "You're back fast."

Amber shrugged, "I forgot that we still haven't resolved that time-differential buffer problem with the portal."

Joe and Trace both raised an eyebrow and their ears, waiting for an explanation.

"When we travel through the portal to here or from here to Cheyenne, it takes you back a minute. So I've actually been gone several more minutes that it seemed. As a matter of a fact, now that I think about it, I was lucky I didn't run into myself. That wouldn't've ended well."

Both Unities nodded. "Well, what was that about, anyhow?" Trace, the older of the two, finally asked.

"Glad you asked, actually," she said. "General Thomas wants to send you military advisers to assist you in your war in exchange for mages to help us in ours."

"I thought you were a military adviser?"

"I am one Human. We're talking upwards of 40 here."

Trace shrugged, "The USA itself doesn't have a military, so I can't help you. Talk to the military man."

Joe nodded, "I've got an office in this building, let's go to it."

Amber nodded and followed him through the corridors of the base. Along the way, she commented, "I keep thinking that Unity Nation and the Alliance are one in the same. I have to remember that they aren't"

"That's hard to do; if you want me to be honest, the two are only separate on paper. We hold the USA by the tail." - an idiom Amber took a second to get - "But that is a matter for another time," he said as they entered into his office.

"Actually, I'd like to discuss it," Amber said.

Joe's ears and eyebrows rose again.

"My superiors want me to start talks for making an alliance with either Unity Nation or the United Species Alliance. They don't care which."

"That's a lot for a sergeant, don't you think? And, the constitution of the USA doesn't allow it to make a formal alliance with another nation; that nation must join the USA instead. It would, however, be possible to make an alliance with your United Nations."

"If I know my superiors,-and I assure you, I do- neither of those is happening... Especially seeing as the United Nations is really no more than a figment of our leader's imaginations. It really doesn't exist any more, not after the Day of Fire."

"Then the alliance will have to be with Unity Nation?"

"Correct."

"Well, I'm not the man to come to for that," Joe said, shaking his head. "I have almost exclusive jurisdiction over the military, but I have almost none over matters of diplomacy, although I have forayed into the practice in the past."

Amber nodded, "Who do I need to talk to?"

"I'd go straight to the president if I were you. The two of us aren't on the best of terms after my most recent foray into diplomacy, so, as far as he's concerned, this conversation never happened. However, seeing as I have the military, the two of us would be better off to decide that." He glanced at his watch, "Perhaps over supper? There's a nice place not too far from here if you want to try some real Unity dishes."

Amber shrugged, she hadn't tried any of the new world's food and she was getting hungry. And, even to have Fox-like ears and tail, this General was rather cute. _Did __I __just__ think__ that__? _"Sure. Why not?"

They left the room and went through the winding halls of the presidential mansion's bunker, finally coming out the exit in the _Lyn__'__knol _post office janitor's closet. Amber still thought that it was among the most clever exits for a secret facility ever invented. As they walked to the restaurant, she noticed that there were very few cars on the roads and, when she commented on this, the General nodded, "Well, I imagine that would be true, in comparison with a world that doesn't have magic."

"How do you mean?"

"Well, only about half the population needs automobiles. The other half is the half capable and trained in using magic. They can use teleportation and portal spells to get from place to place nearly instantly."

Amber nodded slowly, "I'll bet that throws a monkey wrench in security operations..."

"Though I'm not familiar with that idiom, if you mean 'messes it up,' it doesn't do so too severely. All federal buildings are guarded with anti-teleportation spells, though it's only a matter of time before another counter-spell is made." He shrugged, "It's really no more than one more layer of security operations... As a matter of fact, I never thought about it in that manner before, I'm used to thinking of it as an everyday thing."

Amber shrugged, "Whole new world..."

Joe nodded and held the door for her as they entered the restaurant.

* * *

><p>"This is nice," Captain Juniper said as she looked her new APC up and down.<p>

"Very nice," her gunner cackled as he rubbed the 105mm cannon's massive barrel.

Juniper laughed as she realized, "Look at this, there's even a _maschinengewehr_ for the commander."

"That way you can bite too, captain," she heard a man behind her say. Recognizing the voice of her new colonel, she saluted as she turned.

"All due respect, colonel, but I could've done that with magic before."

"Look on the sides of the grips," he returned with a nod.

She found metal strips that were no doubt manna-conducting. "Spells can be cast through it, in addition to bullets," she muttered, nodding.

"Exactly. It also makes your generic energy-bolt spells ten times more precise and potent. It's our latest model. The gunner's coaxial _maschinengewehre_, though, haven't been given the same treatment."

"Because I can't use magic," her gunner said thoughtfully.

"Exactly; WA regulations state that those capable of magic should not be gunners; what's the sense in it? Now, you'll find that it is completely amphibious and has brand-spanking new spells to protect it and also to make the rounds more potent. Magic and technology are better in combination than either is separately, and we intend to make use of that fact. However, another interesting fact about this vehicle is that the original blueprints are not from this world."

Juniper and her crew gasped, "They're from the Great Lane's world?"

The colonel nodded, "Indeed. It was called a Stryker MGS there, though I will admit that we have modified it to better fit our needs."

"Alright!" The driver exclaimed, "I can't wait to test this baby out!"

"Is tonight soon enough?" the colonel asked, leaning against the APC in the next bay with a lopsided grin.

"What do you mean?" Juniper asked.

"You think I came here to make small talk, captain?" he asked and tossed her a manila envelope. "We roll out at dark."

Juniper sighed, opened the package and started reading the briefing. Her eyes grew continually wider as she kept reading. "They can't be serious," she muttered.

"What?" her gunner and driver asked at the same time.

"The plan is to use the new armor and mechanized units to burst through the enemy lines... And lay waste to the civilian encampments inside them..."

"No," her gunner said flatly. "No. I refuse."

Juniper shook her head, "We have to. These orders are straight from the king."

"It's not always that cut and dry, sir," the driver said flatly.

"You don't have an option, lieutenants," the colonel, who Juniper had honestly forgotten about, said.

"Not to mention, have a look at the last paragraph, which you clearly never read, captain."

It read, _This__ mission __will __be __in __collaboration__ with __Unity __Nation __armor __and __infantry __units__. __The __USAF__ squadron__ that __re__-__discovered__ our __world __will__ be __riding __in __the __lead__ Wolf __Army __APC __to __assess __our __style __of __warfare__ and__ to __evaluate __the __effectiveness __of__ the __APCs __and __panzers __they__ gave __us __the __plans __for__. __Congratulations__ to __Captain __Juniper__ and__ her __crew__ for__ this __honor__._

"We're carrying the USAF squadron?"

The colonel nodded and walked out of the room, ignoring her dropped jaw.

At 2030 hours, they received the squadron from the other world.

The five of them, in uniforms not much different from the ones she and her crew wore, walked into her bay, escorted by a burly-looking WA security team.

Juniper introduced herself and her crew, waving the security Wolves away. "Well, are you ready, sergeant?" She asked the leader of the squadron from another world-which would have been a fireteam by WA organization. Juniper had to wonder if WAF organization was different.

Sergent Finney nodded, "Yes, although your superiors said something about getting us communication stones?"

"Oh, yes, it's what we use for radio on the battlefield, no interference, no static, no enemies listening in." She handed each of them one of the stones woven into neck bands. "These will go around your neck. Ours are built into our helmets, but you don't have a slot for them in yours. Just touch the dimple on the side if you want to talk, and so long as they are touching your skin, you'll hear what is being said on them."

They all took the bands and clicked them around their necks, tightening them until they were flush with their skin. "This is impressive, if it works as well as you say, captain," Finney said.

"I assure you, they do. And, sergeant, you'll notice that yours has two stones. The one on your right communicates with only my vehicle and your men. The one on the left is in contact with command."

She nodded, "Very impressive, and please, call me Amber, ranking is rather ambiguous here."

Juniper laughed, "True, call me Juniper, then, if you will."

The serg... Amber nodded, "Very well then. Shall we get going?"

Juniper glanced at her watch, "Yes, I suppose we should, seeing as we're heading the column."

Amber rose an eyebrow as Juniper climbed to the top of the APC, "The commander is leading the column?"

"Of course."

"That's a very poor tactical decision. You should be about the third in line to protect you and the chain of command."

Juniper nodded, "That makes sense. Let me relay this to command." She did so after climbing into the copula and making sure the squadron was secure in the hull of the APC.

"We called this a Stryker back home, after two Medal of Honor recipients," Amber said, "What do you call them here?"

"The Wolves are a very practical people. This is simply an APC VI LGP, or Large Gun Platform."

"Ah," she heard the sergeant say, "Apt description, anyhow."

"That it is," Juniper's gunner butted in, "I don't know who thought to put a 105mm gun on an APC, but whoever it is is a genius!"

She heard the sergeant laugh quietly.

She heard the engine start. It seemed unusually loud and smelled rather foul. "Ugh, what is that smell?" Juniper asked.

"Diesel," the driver responded. "The thing's engine isn't manna-fueled. It burns fossil fuels to create torque instead of using manna's natural energy to turn turbines."

"Part of that new environmental-friendliness crap, no doubt," the gunner muttered.

Amber laughed, "That would be the first time I've heard diesel called environmentally-friendly."

"It has to be better than using manna," Juniper said.

"I wouldn't know," Amber said. "I don't think our world has any manna."

"Oh," the driver said, "I'll bet it's just because they didn't want to change the plans too much, then."

"Likely," Amber said.

The new revelations about the vehicle's power source aside, they got moving. The driver moved the new vehicle out of the bay and onto the tarmac with ease. He stopped and let two vehicles overtake them and followed after them as the column started moving off the base. A panzer column gathered off to her column's left, and she noted that the lead panzer was now third in the line. Command didn't want to mess this operation up, not after how Scythe had over-reacted last time they failed. Any suggestions the USAF squadron made would be heeded as quickly as possible. Juniper wasn't about to complain.

The APCs thundered forward at near their top speed of 100 KPH. She didn't know the top speed of the new panzers, but they looked to be topping out around 70 KPH. "You know anything about the new panzers, Amber?"

"Yeah, they're based off the German Leopard 2A7-140. Diesel engine, 75 KPH top speed, 140mm cannon. Just like the Strykers, they're old vehicles we've mothballed and don't have any more use for; they're outdated. So, we packed them up and sent them through the portal to y'all."

"These are outdated to you?" Juniper asked in shock.

"Yeah. There's been two generations of infantry fighting vehicles since the Stryker, it's over sixty years old. The Leopard 2's... 85 years old, though that version of it is a little newer."

Juniper was shocked. "If these are outdated, I don't even _want _to see what y'all are using now."

"You probably don't, actually," one of the USAF squad members said blandly. "Railguns and lasers are nothing to play around with."

"I've heard of neither of those, so I'm not going to question you," Juniper responded flatly. She wasn't kidding. The Great Lane had made it clear that his home world's tools of war were nothing pretty. That was one of the reasons he'd never designed anything more advanced than ground dragons and advanced ironclads. Unfortunately, Juniper's world hadn't been satisfied with that. After The Great Lane's passing, they'd kept inventing newer and more deadly tools of war, no matter how much General Lane protested while he lived.

Those musings aside, her column charged ahead of the panzers. That was the plan. The APCs could do some serious damage until the panzers arrived, hopefully right as the tide was turning against the WA. That was the plan, anyhow. King Scythe had made it, which, given his lack of tactical prowess in the past, made Juniper doubtful. That he'd only given the crews a few hour's worth of notice and time to adjust to their new equipment made her even more doubtful. So doubtful, in fact, that, for the second time that night, she considered defecting. Considered it very seriously, actually. She decided it was better to keep those thoughts suppressed. Scythe was the king, wasn't he? He knew what he was doing. _By __the __gods__, __I __hope __so__, __anyhow__._

The APCs neared the enemy lines. "Alright, spread out, cover each other," Juniper ordered, watching the other APCs fan out and form a somewhat straight line to her left and right. She scanned the night through the open copula, seeing nothing but road and trees. According to her helmet's HUD, they were technically in enemy territory, but she hadn't seen so much as a sentry. Then again, technical lines were rarely the same as the real lines.

Sure as the world, she spotted panzers hidden behind mounds of dirt several hundred meters ahead of her force. "Halt. Does everyone have eyes on the enemy panzers?"

All the commanders reported that they had them. "Don't lock your turrets on them until you're sure you can take them out. Then do so."

There was a chorus of "Roger," "Yessir," and "Yess'um."

"Alright, then, move out!" She ordered and closed the copula hatch over her head.

She was glad she'd closed the the copula when, half a second later, a sniper's bullet smacked into her forward viewpoint. It sizzled and crackled against the magic shield, the two spells fighting. The one on the Stryker, being much more complex, won. Had one examined the bullet, it no doubt would have been covered in markings that composed the spell. If one closely examined the outside of the Stryker, they would find the same, a spell that wound around the entire outside of the craft's advanced composite panels. Written out on paper, it would have been several hundred pages long and composed of larger symbols. A spell that complex meant that it took a whole lot more than a small arm to take it down. A panzer shell, on the other hand, could, both for the potency of the spell and the explosives themselves.

Speaking of powerful things, the massive cannon on her APC turned towards one of the concealed panzers. She heard the autoloader slam a round into the breech moments before the night was made day for half a second and the round slammed into the turret of the rebel panzer. It brewed up. The guns of the other APCs thundered. More enemy panzers brewed up. Some of the enemies' guns thundered, too. To Juniper's pleasant surprise, only two of her APCs caught fire. The Strykers were some seriously mean vehicles. The remaining enemy panzers retreated from their hiding holes, firing as they went. Many of the crewmembers that had escaped from their burning APCs were gunned down, but the few that made it fit into the largely empty bay of Juniper's vehicle, even if it wasn't very comfortably.

The formation of fighting vehicles kept moving forward after mopping up the retreating enemy panzers. There were more snipers and a few well-placed _maschinengewehre_ emplacements, even one RPG-wielding soldier, but no more panzers, no large, co-ordinated defensive strategy. The civilian encampment was within sight shortly.

"Unit, slow to 55 KPH, let the panzers catch up before we end up charging into a trap," Juniper ordered, being in no great hurry to meet the masks. The panzers were with them shortly.

"_Vorwärts__!" _She called over her mic as both formations of war machines charged forward in a nearly straight line. The maschinengewehre towers and barbed wire that somewhat guarded the civilian encampment came into view as they neared.

The guns along the fence only fired for a few seconds before the gunners gave up their futile posts. The rebels were undisciplined fighters, no doubt about it. _Undisciplined__, __however__, __is __not __equal __to __stupid__, _Juniper thought. It was probably smarter to abandon the posts that wouldn't do any good, despite what her training protested.

The necessary and useful posts, on the other hand, were another story. Mortars came flying over the force and slowly zeroing in on the incoming force. Rocket-propelled grenades tipped with volatile manna crystals zipped out from trenches dug in front of the barbed wire. They struck both panzers and APCs. The panzers that were hit were unaffected. The APCs appeared as though they could actually take a hit from the RPGs, though Juniper wasn't sure about two hits.

* * *

><p>Sergeant Amber Finney put on her helmet and tightened the strap. She checked over her uniform, making sure her bulletproof vest was straight and everything she needed on her belt. She double checked her weapon and waited for the vehicle to stop and the ramp to drop.<p>

Above the roar of the Stryker's diesel engine, she could hear thumps, bangs and terrible road noise as they charged toward the assault force's objective, the hideout of an important rebel general. The Stryker's eight wheels rolled to a stop and the back ramp lowered. Her squadron charged out of the fighting vehicle, fanning out and securing the ground behind it, part of a WA squadron from a destroyed Stryker joining them. Amber was rather amazed at how similar the two worlds' tactics were.

The area secured, she crouched behind the Stryker, glancing around its side. "We weren't briefed very well, where is the rebel general?" Amber asked over the channel with her crew.

Juniper's sigh was not a welcome sound. "You weren't just breifed poorly, you were breifed incorrectly. We're here to lay waste to this civilian encampment."

"No," Amber said.

"I was shocked, too," Juniper said.

"No," Amber said, "it's not that I don't beleive you, it's that I refuse to."

"Good," Juniper said, a white flag raising from her copula. "We do, too. The whole attack force is defecting."


	3. Chapter III

**Sorry for the long delay folks, college really sucks at times. Nonetheless, I got chapter three finished.**

**As always, feedback much appreciated and enjoy the third chapter of the Burning Paper Tigers.**

* * *

><p>"So you think that we're on the wrong side, do you?" Joe asked, shoveling more American food—steak and potatoes—into his mouth.<p>

"I know we are," Amber returned, sipping wine grown in the hills of the Western UN.

Joe nodded. "The WRA has ceased some of its more... primitive tactics in a new PR push. Trust me when I say that it's all politics. Don't let it get to your head."

Amber directed a flat glance at him. "You are every bit as aware of the brutality of that failed attack Scythe ordered as I am. The rebels are not the primitive ones here. Scythe is. I honestly don't know how much longer he'll have any supporters."

Joe nodded and sighed, "I actually wonder how he still has any at this moment, actually."

"Is that agreement I hear?" Amber asked, sampling more of the delectable UN food, like lightly roasted deer and highly cooked vegetables. Joe had told her that the stomachs and palates of Unities, being half omnivore and half carnivore, didn't take too kindly to many plants. Seeing as Amber hadn't had real, fresh, vegetables in months, she partook of them just fine.

"It might be," Joe said. "Listen, I ain't stupid. I can see what Scythe is doing. However, thousand-year-old alliances don't die easy. I may have mostly exclusive jurisdiction over the military itself, but The Congress holds power to declare war and peace. At the moment, The Congress still believes that we need be at war with the Rebels, not the King."

Amber nodded. She understood. She didn't like it, but that was far from not understanding. "Then tell me you've ceased your attacks on the rebels, at bare minimum?" She asked hopefully.

Joe grinned toothily—being about half Fox and Tiger, it was a very toothy grin indeed—"Oh, c'mon, you know me better than that. Of course I have."

Amber rolled her eyes and watched him wipe gratuitous amounts of food from around his mouth. Unity traditions said nothing about being a clean eater. Amber found it both just plain strange, while at the same time strangely refreshing. The world she'd found herself in was totally different from the world she was used to... but she somehow liked the more lax and laidback Unity Nation. It wasn't like it was closer to being savage and it was no more primitive than the US, but it had a more homely, less acculturated, less snooty and proper, feel to it. Amber, being a bit of a country girl herself, very much liked that.

It was about then that she realized that she'd been staring into Joe's bright blue eyes. _That's really not a smart thing to do,_ she thought, breaking her stare.

Joe raised an eyebrow and an attentive ear. "Thinking about something, are we?" He asked.

Amber felt herself blush and looked away. "Sorry about that," she said, "I honestly don't know what happened there. I was thinking about how different our worlds are."

Joe chuckled sarcastically. "Sure you were. My brother keeps giving me heck about you, you know."

"Trace? What do you mean?"

"He's always giving me heck about being single. Since you showed up, you've become part of that."

Amber raised an eyebrow. "Is that so? What are your thoughts on the matter?"

"I told him I'd see what happened. That's more than I usually give him."

"That so?" She asked contemplatively.

Joe nodded as the waiter gave them their tab. After the waiter had gone, he pulled out his pocket watch (a wristwatch would have chaffed his fur) and checked the time. "Tell you what, the theatre down the street is playing _The Great Lanes_ here in about fifteen minutes. You'd probably like it and I've yet to see it all the way through. You want to go?"

Amber grinned widely, almost flirtatiously, "Is this a date you're suggesting?" She honestly didn't believe it.

Joe shrugged, "Might be," and grinned again.

Amber smiled, "Then I'm all for it... By the way, how did you know when they were playing that movie?"

Joe appeared to choose his words carefully, "I may or may not have checked beforehand."

"This is the third time we've gone to supper, for business at that, and you're already checking up on movies?"

"Not sure how dating works on your world, but that's nothing unusual here."

Amber smiled, "I'm messing with you, you know, right?"

Joe rolled his eyes. "Let's go before I'm ready to elbow you in the ribs."

* * *

><p>Wolf King Scythe yelled at the top of his lungs, "I have seen failure and I have seen incompetence! But how does... This work? Our whole First Armored and Fifth Mechanized Infantry divisions defected to the fools! With our brand-new armor from The Great Lane's world! How?"<p>

"Permission to speak freely, sir?" General Nari asked.

"Begrudgingly granted," Scythe said flatly.

Nari nodded, "Sir, they refused to kill innocent civilians. They couldn't stomach it. It's that simple."

"It is not!" Scythe exclaimed, "They were trained to obey what I told them to do, what their training told them to do, not what their 'stomachs' could handle! We can't win a war this way, Wolves. We've got to fight any way we can!"

"Sir," Nari said, "We can't exactly choose when our forces defect. What we can do is not give them missions or orders that will cause them to. That I know of, there is no other solution."

"There has to be one," Scythe said in seething thoughtfulness. "Have the field commanders shoot anyone who disobeys orders."

"It is worth noting that the field commanders of our strike on the civilian compound defected, too."

Scythe felt his ears lay down in thought. He let out a low exasperated growl. "If I can't trust the field commanders to obey and insure my men do, then who can I trust? Who... or what, will always obey?"

"Magic," Nari said. "Control spells were used on slaves in the era before The Great Lane. They could be used on soldiers all the same. There would be nothing but perfect obedience then."

"Good, good," Scythe said, feeling—and no doubt looking—very smug. At least he had one Wolf with good ideas. And he soon would have plenty of men and women he could count on.

* * *

><p>"You're kidding me, right?" Joe asked Wolf General Nari at the next week's USA BoG meeting. "Control spells violate, what, fifteen,"<p>

The Bastian General broke in, "Try sixteen,"

Joe nodded in thanks and continued, "United Species Alliance regulations? You start using them and you can forget what little help you have from Unity Nation."

"Like you're really giving much help at the moment," Nari snarled back.

Joe couldn't give him much, but the Wolf High General wasn't a fool. He'd noticed when Joe had stopped his attacks and drives into WRA territory. Joe shrugged. "Well, no guarantees about the fate of your nuclear... erm, atomic, weapons if you withdraw from the alliance."

"Just what are you insinuating, General Lane?" Nari asked, sounding both angry and confused at the same time.

"Our alliance with the Wolf Nation was the only thing preventing my crack teams of operatives from destroying your atomic weapons stores. If that goes away, on the other hand..."

"You wouldn't," Nari growled.

"I'm certain he would," the Bastian General said, "Because we are ready to do the same."

The Fox and Tiger Generals didn't say anything, but the smug look on their furry faces and the attentiveness of their ears told Joe that their nations were ready to do the same.

"General Nari, think about it. Once the alliance is gone, what have we to lose? Nothing. We have the safety and security of our whole world to gain," Joe said very matter-of-factly. His tail twitched with aggravation.

Nari let out a low growl. Joe thought it might have been the Wolf form of an exasperated sigh. "Gentlemen, I find it very sad that I am torn between my king and my country. The two should never be separate. I fear that they have become so."

"Then why are you still on the wrong side?" Joe asked rather pointedly.

"Scythe didn't ask before he used the control spell on his highest generals."

Joe's jaw dropped, his ears fell and he felt his tail go lax. The other generals assembled around the table had their respective species' form of the look. "Then I don't think you need be here, General Nari," The Human Republic's General, who was very quiet, reserved and rarely spoke, said in his usual slow baritone, stroking his long white beard.

"Why is that?" Nari asked, sounding offended.

"I think the answer is obvious," the Bastian General said, "Wolf Nation is no longer an official part of the United Species Alliance."

General Nari snarled and put up quite a fuss, but he reluctantly got up, grabbed his briefcase and made his way out the door without another word.

"We need to relay this to the diplomatic side of things," the Dog General said.

"I'll send it to my brother," Joe said. "Trace'll be sure to do something about it and on short notice."

"I'll get you a copy of the minutes and a recording of the meeting," the secretary, a soft-spoken Unity who never said anything except when his job demanded he do so, stated matter-of-factly.

Joe nodded to the secretary, "Danke." To the assembled generals he turned and mused, "Gentlemen, our world just got a whole lot more interesting."

* * *

><p>UNAF Sergeant Kelly Youngston-Lane checked over his maschinenpistole. All the spells that spiraled around the inside of the barrel were intact and hadn't been scratched off. The grooves of the rifling were clean. The rounds in the clip still had their spells; special ones that wound past the bullet itself and onto spiral tails that went back into the cartridge. The small überschall stealth transport jet he rode in zipped over the ancient border mountains. The Unity Nation Special Forces had been activated to destroy Wolf Nation's atomic weapons. Presently, a fleet of Lane Industries <em>Schwarzen Adlen<em> stealth small transports were carrying the men towards the missile silos in groups of five.

Groups of two stealth fighters, adapted from the F-22 of The Great Lane's world, flew escort for each_ Adler_. As much chaos as the Wolf command structure was in and as good as UN stealth was, Kelly doubted that the escorts were really necessary. The UN, however, was not a nation prone to taking chances it didn't need to.

The pilot interrupted his thought process, "We're nearing the drop zone."

Kelly and his fire team began incantations—they were going to be dropped from a jet going past the speed of sound, meaning they'd need a little protection from magic if they wished to live. The shield formed around him and Kelly stood straight as he possibly could, tucking his tail neatly between his legs and making sure his ears were hid under his helmet. The light on the front compartment wall turned to green. Kelly took a breath in as the floor under him opened, revealing the ground of Wolf Nation beneath him. As he fell, he slammed into the jet's slipstream and again into its hot afterburner. He saw the bay doors close as the larger black ship made a wide turn back home.

He and his squadron just kept falling. They all stayed straight, heading for the ground like so many arrows. Slight movements of his body corrected his path onto his target, seemingly small and far below him. It looked like any other house, actually, but the barbed wire and large concrete disks in the ground for miles around it gave the house away as the command host of WN AMCICBM launch site number 1-5. The house grew ever larger as Kelly and his squadron streaked toward it at terminal velocity. He checked an altimeter in his helmet's HUD. 300... 200... 100. He balled up and felt himself smash into the house's roof, knocking out support beams and going through the ceiling. The magical shield around him left him unscathed, though it was clearly almost shattered. _Might take a hit for me, though,_ he thought and decided not to break the spell as he stood up quickly, staying at the ready. Wolves moaned from under the roof he and his squad mates had collapsed.

He reached behind him and grabbed his gun off his back, bringing it to his hip as an unarmed wolf ran into the room. "Surrender," Kelly told it flatly.

"I'm not able to," the Wolf said and lunged at him, snarling.

Kelly's Tiger instincts kicked in instantly, bringing his booted foot up, connecting with the Wolf's side in a rapid spinning kick, shoving the Wolf to his side and putting its face into the floor. He continued the spin until the barrel of his weapon was pointed at the Wolf's back, now buried in the rubble of the roof. He snapped the stubby unibody gun to his shoulder, bringing the reflex sight into alignment in front of his face. He quickly brought the crosshair just below the lip of the Wolf's helmet and fired a single shot into the back of his neck. "Be aware," Kelly said to his men, "the enemy will not surrender. Shoot on sight."

"Those controls spells of Scythe's?" Private Dean Winchester-Legacy muttered as a question.

"Yeah, _verdammt _spells. _Verdammt_ crazy king," Kelly said as he moved out of the room into the next, sweeping it with the barrel of his gun. A Wolf, armed with a bolt action rifle, ran into the room, no doubt investigating some pretty nasty things that he'd heard. He rapidly drew it to his shoulder when he saw the team of black-garbed Unities. Kelly was a bit faster on his draw, bringing the Wolf down with a quick three-round burst. "Are these guys wearing magical shields at all or are they that stupid?" Kelly asked, putting another two rounds into the face of an assault-rifle armed Wolf.

"I think our bullets' spells are just that good," Dean said.

"I guess it's possible," Kelly said, "But they just don't seem like they're really trying to fight, do they?"

"That's a good point," Dean said, scanning the room around them.

A Wolf burst through the door, assault rifle blazing as he crossed the threshold. One of the bullets hit Kelly square over the heart, shattering what was left of his shield and stopping somewhere in his body armor. He instinctively dove behind a desk, letting magically-enhanced copper-jacketed lead fly at the Wolf. The rounds struck the WAF Captain in his body-armored chest and impacted the wall and door behind him. They had no visible effect. One of his privates—though Kelly didn't catch which—put a couple rounds just below the foe's helmet, stopping him cold.

Catching a breath behind the desk, Kelly muttered, "I stand corrected."

Dean huffed, "I'll say you do."

Kelly rolled his eyes and got up, doing a brief and silent headcount. All of his men were still there, though it looked like they'd all lost their magical protection. They'd have to be careful. The team moved through the next room, scanning it, finding it empty save three doors. One was the one they'd just gone through, the second lead outside and the third was closed and locked. "I think this one's our ticket," Kelly said, facing the lattermost, waving for his squadron to gather at their door-breaching positions. He set a hand on the door and started looking through it with magic. He found that, behind the wooden door was a much thicker one of metal and concrete. "Yeah, this is it," he said, motioning to his demolitions expert, who also rubbed the wall with a glowing hand.

The private shook his head, "The idiots reinforced the door like crazy, but the wall's just cinder blocks hid behind drywall."

Kelly rolled his eyes, confident the UN would never make such a folly. "Then you can handle it?" He asked his resident pyromaniac.

"Well of course," he said, slapping shaped charges onto the wall. Kelly motioned for the rest of his men to go back to a safer location, now that a wall breach was simpler than a door breach. They all retreated to the previous room. The demolitions expert ran into the room, taking cover just behind Kelly, who hid right behind the door frame. He heard a click as the detonator was triggered and, in the same instant, a massive explosion.

Through the smoke in the next room, he could see the massive hole that had been blown into the wall and, more faintly, the Wolves scrambling around behind it. He leaned around the door and fired a long burst into the room, though he really couldn't be sure if he'd hit any enemies though the chaos. He ejected the horizontal clip, pulling it off the top of the gun and jamming another in, cocking the bolt and bringing the first round into the chamber. He took in a deep breath and motioned for his men to move, keeping his senses—sharper than a humans but not quite as sharp as the full Keidran he fought—on high alert. They charged out the small door and into the opening they'd made in the adjacent wall. For Kelly, it was nothing but a blur.

He ran, he fired, ran some more, fired some more, dove behind cover and fired some more. He took in a deep breath and regained his senses from the blur. Becoming mechanical in combat was a good way to get himself killed and Kelly knew it. That recalled, he re-surveyed his surroundings. Five or six Wolves, all armed with assault rifles, were hid behind various points of cover in the room. At the end was a highly reinforced set of doors. Those doors were to an elevator that no doubt went where he needed to be. His target in mind, he decided that eliminating the Wolves guarding it would be smart and picked one out, waiting for his head to pop up at just the right time. Finally, the Wolf did, earning it a 5.7×28mm round to the forehead. Kelly switched prospective targets, only to have one of his men take the Wolf out before he had the chance. He scanned the room and found another target, this time taking the grey wolf down before any of his men had the chance.

That Wolf down, Kelly thought that he'd cleared the room. Nonetheless, he and his men were cautious as they fanned out and checked it quietly and thoroughly. "Clear," Kelly said, lowering his gun, but not his guard, not by a hair. "Judging by the scrollwork on that elevator door, we'll need your handiwork, Dean," Kelly said, motioning the soldier towards the door. Dean was his best mage by a long shot. This said, however, Dean still took several minutes to crack the spell, with his technology-oriented man working on the control panel to its right. As usual, they both finished at roughly the same time and the doors slid open. Kelly smiled and nodded to them as he climbed in. He was the only one that went down the shaft.

He found that the elevator only had two buttons. He also found that some Wolf had taped a piece of paper with "Hell" sloppily written on it in Keidran over the second button. Kelly let out a rueful chuckle and pressed that button, feeling the elevator move downward rather rapidly. _Wait a second, _Kelly thought, _why was the elevator at the top of the shaft? _Deciding that safe was better than sorry, he keeled down low and aimed his gun up. The elevator ride seemed to go on forever. Finally it stopped and several different doors opened in front of him. He found the small area in front of him empty. He cautiously moved into that concreted area, scanning his surroundings with his gun's barrel, staying crouched low. It was clear. Oddly enough, the door to the small concrete and steel pod that housed the real control center for the atomic missiles stood wide open. Kelly scratched his head and peered in, gun before him. The controls were empty. Clearly, the operators had gone to the top to assist in stopping Kelly's men. That clearly hadn't worked too well for them. That discovered, Kelly climbed into the cramped pod and took a seat in one of the chairs. He dug a memory stone—not far removed from his communications stone, but used for computer memory, much like the less practical flash drive—from a uniform pocket. He sat it on a stone receptacle on the computer terminal and listened to the old computers whir as the UN coding and spells did their work. Shortly, a countdown appeared on the old screen. Kelly grinned and ran back to the elevator, hitting the up button as he crossed into it.

The ride up seemed to take forever. He bolted out of the elevator, calling to his men, "Please tell me the extraction team is on its way!"

"Yessir," one of them replied as they fell into formation behind him, running. The extraction point was several miles away and there was no way for him to teleport to it; not without a waypoint. He wished he could have just teleported back to the UN, but it was simply too far... He shrugged and got to work hotwiring one of the Wolf Air Force vehicles as his men piled in. That accomplished, he shifted into first, pressing the gas and releasing the clutch. The large utility vehicle bucked back and forth as the clutch locked in and it got off to a slow start. It was longer than Kelly was used to before he had to let off the gas and press the clutch again, shifting into second.

He finally did make it up to fourth gear on the terribly constructed vehicle and cruised toward the large field of an extraction point at somewhere around 70 kph. The ride was terribly bumpy, but Kelly really didn't worry about it. He would be gone shortly. He shot into the field and stamped the clutch and brake, stopping the vehicle with neck-jerking, grass streaking force. He shifted it into neutral and jumped out, the rest of his men doing the same. They all filed into the hubschrauberthat was waiting for them. Kelly sighed and sunk back into a seat, waving to the pilot to takeoff as Dean slid the door closed.

Kelly looked at his watch and out the window. He kept waiting... only a second longer... There it was. Suddenly, the hundreds of concrete domes and the ground around them lifted up and collapsed back onto themselves. Kelly grinned. Those atomic weapons wouldn't be used by anyone any time soon.

* * *

><p>King Scythe looked the Unity Nation and Bastian ambassadors over. He let out a growl, "You two realize this is an act of war, right?"<p>

The UN ambassador laughed hardily. "Alright, declare war then, please do. It would make my job so much easier. Our special forces defeated you with five to one odds, all over your nation. Do you really want to face us man-to-man? Panzer to panzer? Only a madman would try."

The Bastian looked at the Unity, "I think he's just crazy enough to try."

"Let. Him. Try," the Unity said, leaning over the table and making the statement very pointed. "Do I even need to mention that The Great Lane's world is on our side?"

Scythe let out a low growl. "I am well aware of the facts, ambassador. Sometimes, you have to stand for what you believe in, however."

"Tyranny? You find that worth standing for?" The Unity said with a hint of a growl himself.

"I am opposing tyranny! I am standing for tradition! Well over two thousand years of it!" Scythe exclaimed, throwing his hands up in the air in helplessness. The two ambassadors had thick skulls, that was for sure. Could he not bring them to see?

The Unity stared him down. "Look, Your Majesty, we don't want any more of our men to die. You don't declare war on us and we won't do anything more to you. We wanted to remove the chance of this turning into a global atomic holocaust. That was all we wanted. We want no more part in your war."

* * *

><p>Axe busied himself with paperwork behind a very normal desk. There was plenty of the stuff to keep busy, that was for sure. Now that the Wolf Rebel Army was beginning to form a tentative new government, Axe was starting to have to concern himself with diplomacy. He hated the idea. He hated politics, but he'd made leading people his job. Politics were unavoidable when you started leading people. <em>Diplomacy, <em>he thought, _would be better left avoided, but they, the people, want me to be their leader. I can't lead them and not do everything in my power to protect them. '_Everything in his power,' of course, included making sure that he was in right standing with the more powerful nations of his world. He'd tried associations with the Arctic Wolves, but had come up empty handed.

The Bastian People's Republic, on the other hand, had been very helpful. They'd given the Rebel Army some of their best air and armor divisions, along with advisers and instructors for his soldiers. As it turned out, most of Axe's men had been better at tactics than the Bastians, who were still using textbook Lane Doctrine. The Great Lane may have been a genius, but his tactics were made for a very different battlefield; one Axe's men no longer faced. The dragons had also known how to fight and had helped his men. That had meant that the Rebels had had better tactics than the King's men for some time; meant that the Rebels were able to scrape out victories, especially after they acquired Wolf Army panzers and crews from defecting units. When a squadron from The Great Lane's world had arrived in the UN, however, and when the UN had begun its atomic policy, the men and women of the Wolf Rebel Army had started losing again. The Unities started getting better tactics and more advanced weaponry...

But then Axe (with the help of his beautiful wife) had realized that he needed to start waging more than just a military campaign, but also a campaign for the hearts and minds of the millions of people of the four different species around the globe. That had had a lot of impact. Recruitment and defectment rates had surged and sympathy for the rebels all over the globe had gone up. That was when Scythe decided that he would hit the rebels right in the heart—their civilians. The whole attack force, composed of two divisions, with the squadron from The Great Lane's world riding shotgun, had defected to the rebels. That attack convinced Unity Nation to cease its attacks on the Rebels. It had also gained the WRA two divisions' worth of the most advanced military equipment on the planet. That had given the Rebels all they needed to beat back the Wolf Army substantially, despite Scythe's last resort control spells.

Those control spells had also lead to some interesting developments, like what was happening that day. Right on cue, Axe's new secretary opened the door on his new office, "Comrade General Secretary," - The position in the new government Axe had reluctantly accepted - "the ambassador from Unity Nation is here."

"Ah, yes, let him in, thank you, comrade."

The slim, tall Unity, with close-cropped black hair, thin red-orange fur striped with brown-black stripes, white running across his face, down his neck and below his suit collar, walked in. He nodded to Axe and walked over to his desk, extending a hand. As Axe took it to shake, the ambassador asked, "How may I address you, General Secretary?"

"First, have a seat, please," Axe said, motioning towards the two simple chairs in front of the even simpler desk, "then you can call me Axe; I'm a very simple man. How may I address you?"

The ambassador nodded, seeming impressed. "George will do just fine."

Axe grinned, "That decided, I want to extend the thanks of this budding nation's peace-loving workers, soldiers and peasants to you and your people for their assistance in our struggle against our oppressors."

George nodded, "We did what needed to be done. Nothing more. If Scythe doesn't declare war on us, it's all we'll do."

Axe grimaced and sat back in his chair, thinking. "I understand, I'm afraid." He scratched the tuft of fur under the end of his muzzle, "However, I suspect that, the madman he is, Scythe will declare on the entire USA, just to prove a point formed in his deranged mind."

George chuckled, "Have you talked to the king recently?"

"No, he rather hates us and we rather hate him. Why do you ask?"

"You seem to know him well. My previous appointment was with him. He said, and I quote, 'I am well aware of the facts, ambassador. Sometimes, you have to stand for what you believe in, however.'"

Axe chuckled. "Sounds like him, anyhow. I used to do contract work for the king, when I was a construction worker. The new annex wing of the palace? My work crew built it. I conferred with him frequently. I was inspired by him then. Now?" he let out a snort. "I see how foolish and young I was."

George nodded. "You lead the crew?"

Axe returned the nod.

"That's no doubt where you learned to lead the common people."

Axe shrugged, "Perhaps. Perhaps I just told people what they needed to hear; did what needed to be done. That is my personal opinion of the matter, anyhow."

The ambassador shrugged, "A humble and respectable opinion, at that."

Axe shrugged, "I try."

"Will all due respect, General Secretary, I believe you do better than try. I believe you succeed, in more ways than one."

Axe shrugged, "I've never taken compliments well, but thank you, Ambassador."

"You're very welcome, sir," the Unity said, rising and again extending his hand.

Axe rose as well, clasping the dignitary's hand firmly, "Please don't call me sir, and it was good to speak with you. I hope our two nations become most beneficial to one another."

As they stepped to the door, George chuckled, "Scythe was rather stingy. I get the feeling our nations will get along just fine with you at the helm.

Axe grinned, "Then I guess we'll meet again?"

"Probably before this bloody war's over," George said condescendingly and walked out the door.

Axe grimaced—toothily, he was a Wolf, after all—and got back on that pesky paperwork.

* * *

><p>Wolf Rebel Army Colonel Juniper surveyed the battlefield from the open hatch of her panzer with a pair of binoculars. Below her, WRA militia units and Ground Dragons ran in full retreat from several divisions of Scythe's armor and infantry. Presently, she sat concealed behind the old trees of the Forest of Wolves on top of a large hill. Actually, the hill was called a "formation," specifically, the "Wolves' Bowl," an area where the hills and mountains at the very southern end of the Great Border Mountains formed a large bowl surrounded by forests housing a bare grassy plain at its center. There was only one pass into and out of the bowl, and the rebel militia and Ground Dragons had retreated straight into it.<p>

Typically, retreating to here would have been a tactical folly, and a severe one at that; leaving the forces with no way to retreat and surrounded by a superior army. It wasn't a folly that day. Or, actually, it was a folly; for Scythe's troops, who were left with no way to retreat and surrounded by a superior army. Juniper's division, which was more like a small army, was all around the rim of the crater, hiding just behind the tree line. Scythe's forces were twenty meters downhill, sixty years outdated and fifty units outgunned. And they were trapped, too. They only began to realize this when two columns of older WRA panzers and APCs sealed off the pass and the militia units got into fortifications they'd dug themselves. That meant it was time for Juniper's forces to do their part.

Juniper touched her comm stone, "All units, spring the trap."

The massive diesel engine in her Leopard II panzer roared to life, its gun traversing and finding a target as the beast of a machine lurched forward. The massive gun thundered and one of the tyrant's panzers went up in a massive fireball. Several more followed as Leopard II panzers and Stryker APCs rolled out of the woods, cannon thundering and maschinengewehre blazing. 200mm artillery on the rim of the bowl opened up. Regular professional infantry followed right behind the massive armored beasts. In short order, the bowl became a chopping block.

On the floor of that chopping block, WRA units fought it out with their counterparts who unwillingly served an unjust king. Scythe's men seemed to take a long time to realize just how badly they'd been trapped and the extent of the rebel forces. They clustered up in the center of the valley, fighting it out to the last man. Rebels climbed into turrets and killed crewmen of panzers with their rifles or magic, saving the equipment in a desperate attempt to bolster the Rebels' pathetic arsenal. The attempt was rather successful, Juniper noted as the Rebels mopped up. As usual, there were no prisoners. Scythe's control spells didn't allow his men to surrender. That was a tragedy, one over which Juniper had lost more than a few nights' sleep over, but the Rebels dealt with it quite nicely, and they still got recruits (granted, untrained recruits) from the civilian populace, whom even Scythe didn't dare enslave.

Panzers and APCs were shut off as the soldiers got out and combed the field, salvaging all the equipment they could off Scythe's slain forces, all the while taking a silent body count of their own dead. Juniper's panzer shut off, too, and she climbed out of the copula, sitting on the side of the massive flat turret. Her gunner followed and sat on his rather large instrument of death. The mission had really been straightforward enough that Juniper hadn't honestly needed to be there to command it; she hadn't even had to tell her men to cease fire. The Rebels had their _kacke _together at all times. They knew what they were fighting for and they didn't want to screw it up. Along those same lines, Juniper was there if something did go wrong.

The gunner lit a cigarette. Juniper ignored the acrid stench that emanated from it. She hated the things. Nonetheless, her gunner was a very competent man; the same one who'd operated her Stryker and the WA APC before that. "Should've just dropped an atom bomb on 'em," he remarked, surveying the battlefield.

"Would've been easier and cleaner, that's for sure," Juniper muttered. "But our objective was to salvage materials and supplies, too."

The gunner looked thoughtful as he took a drag. "Pity we can't do both."

Juniper took her turn at looking thoughtful. "If we detonated it just far enough above the ground, it might kill the soldiers and leave most of the equipment."

The burlier Wolf nodded as he took another puff, "And any survivors will be left without magic. It could work."

Juniper's whole body, jaw, tongue, ears and tail included, went lax. "Heinz, no magic... means..."

"...no control spells," they finished in a shocked unison as Heinz's cigarette fell from his mouth.

* * *

><p>Jason laid on his bed silently. His little sister was curled up in a ball beside him, trying to sleep. Both their sensitive Dog ears could hear through the thin trailer walls into the next room. They were tuned in on the conversation—argument—his parents were having. Jason sighed, it wasn't pretty.<p>

"How in the gods' names did you forget the lorry payment?" his mom almost-put not quite-yelled.

He could have been worse off, he supposed. His parents weren't divorced. His father wasn't a drunkard or a druggie. Nor was he abusive or mean (at least to Jason and his brothers). For that matter, neither was his mother. They were loving and caring to him and his siblings, at all times. In all honesty, the only problem his family really had was money... or the lack thereof. That was about it. Sometimes, when the money ran low, things got... messy. And loud. Very loud. Well, there were other things that contributed, too, like the collection of crackheads, prostitutes and drunkards that composed his mother's side of the family. Along that trail of thought, adopting his abandoned niece was often a subject of their more heated debates.

He tossed and turned. Thin trailer walls and superior animal senses didn't help at all. His little sister huddled ever closer to him. She held her ears desperately, seemingly trying to claw the noise away. The fights were hard on everyone in the house. His younger brother looked at him with hollow, helpless eyes from his bed on the other side of the room.

She finally unclenched her ears and looked at him desperately, "Jason, when will they stop?"

"I don't know, Kate, I don't know," he said, every bit as helplessly, no matter how much confidence he tried to put in his voice. The same desperation he saw in her tiny green eyes was no doubt present in his larger yellow ones.

Ever since the economy had gone downhill and taxes quite the other way, his family had had these kinds of problems. It was becoming a weekly deal on the day his parents did the bills. If it weren't for those taxes and perhaps the skyrocketing price of liquid manna, he would have been sleeping quite nicely. _The King regulates both those things, _he thought with a sneer. He reflected on what was happening only a few miles north in Wolf country. _That needs to happen here,_ he thought. That would fix it. Getting rid of the king would fix it. He took in a deep breath. _You want something done right, you gotta do it yourself, _he thought_._ So he decided to do it, taking Kate and putting her in bed with her brother. "You two look out for each other," he said. "Stay here, no matter what happens. I'll be back. I don't know when, but I _will _be back and things _will _be better when I get back."

They looked at him helplessly as he went about the room, putting on a full military uniform he used for mil-sim with his buddies. He put a real handgun and as many manna crystals as he could find on the utility belt, grabbing his smartphone off its charging stone as he walked out the door and into the hall. He walked right past the fighting animals that somewhat resembled his parents and grabbed the keys to the lorry (which apparently hadn't been paid for) on his way out the door.

He floored it to the nearest city, hoping to be caught by a policeman. The police in the Dog Kingdom were rather underpaid. The king signed their paycheck. It wasn't long before one of His Majesty's finest caught up with him. "License and registration please," he demanded monotonically once Jason pulled over.

"Do I really need to?" Jason asked, not giving the officer time to respond, "Aren't you terribly underpaid for the important job you do?"

"Well, yes..."

"Isn't everything too expensive?"

"Rather."

"Aren't you tired of it?" Jason asked pointedly, grinning widely.

"I am," the cop said with resolve.

"Isn't it the King's fault?"

"It is!"

"Then get on your comm stone and get all your buddies into the city and off duty. We're having a riot! The King's time is up!"

The officer rushed back to his car and stayed there for some time. He came back out ecstatic. "Several will be stopping people on the highways into town and get those people fired up. Several will go into the city and get things heated up there, too. You're a genius, kid, and you're getting a police escort to this thing!"

* * *

><p>"General Lane, Grand General Lane," a voice called from afar.<p>

If took Joe several seconds to realize that he was not, in fact, at the restaurant with Amber, as he'd been happily dreaming. Instead, he was in bed on base and his secretary was paging him through the intercom.

"What is it, airman?" he asked groggily.

"Emergency session of the USA BoG has been called. Trust me, it's important. Nora is waiting on the roof."

Joe was instantly awake. Many years of military life had acquired him that skill. He rapidly put his dress uniform on and rushed up to the roof, where a small white dragon with oversized wings and bulging muscles waited on him. He ran over to her, not even stopping as he hooked on foot into a stirrup, swinging his leg over her neck and locking the other foot in. A pat to her side let her know he was ready as he laid down against the contour of her neck, which instantly conformed to his shape.

She bolted off into the cold night. _"What is it this time, Joe?" _Lady Nora asked.

"I'd love to know," he shouted over the roar of air that her fight—near the speed of sound in her present, fighter-like form—generated. A spell streamlined the two of them as much as possible, while keeping the wind out of Joe's eyes. "I'm told it's important, however," he finished.

"_Must be if they called me," _Nora said in the manner in which dragons spoke. The Lady had been in the service of Unity Nation since well before it was a nation at all.

With the speeds she was pulling, it was only a short time before they arrived at the USA Military Command Center—USAMCC for short—which was located on the border between the UN and HR, as close to the center of the world as its planners could put it. Joe dismounted no sooner than Nora's feet touched the tarmac, thanked her, and ran inside, straightening his uniform as he went. Thankfully, he wasn't last to arrive, but he was closer than he would have liked.

When all parties had arrived (The Bastian General, having the farthest to travel, arrived last), Joe broke the silence promptly, "Would someone please tell me why I've been drug out here at the godsforsaken hour of 0200 hours now?"

The Dog general spoke slowly, "The same riots that started the Wolf Revolution? They are happening in some of our northern cities and towns. Policemen appear to be leading them."

"Policemen?" the Tiger general asked.

"Yes, apparently fed up with how little they say they get paid and the abuses they apparently suffer."

Joe let out a singular chuckle, "Someone definitely has a healthy taste for irony."

* * *

><p>Jason stopped his lorry outside of a block of government buildings that were closed for the night. He grabbed a glass wine bottle from the bed and poured liquid manna into it from the gas tank, stuffing a rag into its mouth and pulling a lighter out of his pocket<p>

The officer got out of his patrol car, looking somewhat shocked, "What are you doing?"

Jason lit the wick, "I'm burning a paper tiger," and tossed.


	4. Chapter IV

Alright, guys, sorry Chapter IV is so late in coming. It is mostly action, which is hard to write, and I've had I think eight papers due for college professors. In other words, I've had very little time to write, and, when I have, it's been slow.

Another reason is that I've started another project; one even shorter than BPT, but still based on The Outsider. I should be putting it up as soon as I have the first chapter finished. It will be primarily romance, so be warned. It may also slow my progress here on BPT, but that's a small matter; two for the price of one, right?

Anyhow, enjoy! Feedback always welcome!

* * *

><p>Amber didn't like what she was hearing at all. Now that the formal alliance with Unity Nation had been made, the United States had become a honorary part of the United Species Alliance, which meant that she got to sit in on its Board of Generals meetings—even though she had only just been promoted to captain. The general had chocked her slow promotions up to a lack of need—the USAF barely had fifty airmen on the new world, which had been designated Terra II. It made sense, not that Amber liked it, but it made sense. Nonetheless, she was still in charge of pretty much all the USAF operations on Terra II. Four weeks into the Dog Kingdom riots and with a United Wolf People's Socialist Republic victory on the verge, there was a lot to be in charge of.<p>

The UWPSR was seeking admission into the USA and the debate was ongoing. All the representatives wanted to add the UWPSR, but the politics of the matter were still there. What would happen if they did the same to the Dog when a possible government succeeded the monarchy? The Dog King, unlike Scythe, was no madman, nor was he cruel, or at least all the evidence Amber had seen pointed toward that. He'd been most helpful in securing the border and keeping Scythe's supporters from escaping the country.

"I have no problem with the UWPSR," The Dog General was saying, "The problem lies in that, if you admit them to the USA, the pseudo-governments that will surely spring up in my home country will also expect your assistance and admittance. This worries me, as I believe it has every right to."

Joe grimaced, "I believe it does, as well, but we can't allow this to influence a decision regarding a nation that could become a powerful ally."

"Your current ally," the Tiger General noted with pointed accuracy.

Joe shrugged, "This is true, but what problem with it have you? Have any of you?"

"Riots are starting up in our nation as well," the Tiger said with a sigh and slight shake of his head, his ears laying back and sharp teeth pressing into a depressing yet seemingly dangerous grimace.

The Human General sighed and spoke slowly, considerately, "The victory of the Wolf Rebels has sparked these all over the world. We had feared this, I more than any of you, I suspect. I will admit that there are riots within our own nation, ones with no real cause."

Amber heard the murmurs of a low growl from Joe, "This is going to be a growing problem. If we admit the UWPSR, it will only grow, and I know it as well as any of you."

The Dog General nodded, "This doesn't solve the problem for my nation. The riots are growing more and more destructive and organized. The police that lead the riots are making sure that only government buildings and government supporters are hit. It's already gaining army-like tactics. It's rather scary."

"Hold on a second," Amber said, "if they are organized, have you tried negotiating?"

"Unsuccessfully."

She nodded, "There is a concept from my world—called a Limited Monarchy—from my world which may help put an end to your problem and still keep your king in power."

The Dog General nodded, "We will most certainly have to speak afterwards."

Amber nodded back as the Bastian gestured to a magical image appearing at the end of the table opposite the secretary. A three-dimensional, almost holographic, Wolf appeared, holding a stone like the one from which the image was emitted. Amber recognized the Wolf as Juniper, the commander of the WA Strykers Amber and her men had been reviewing.

* * *

><p>Grey Army General Juniper surveyed the battlefield again. It was the perfect setup. Divisions of the King's Army were forming around a weak point in her lines, massing to push through it. She grinned and pulled a holographic stone out of her pocket, connecting it with the one in the USA Board of Generals' meeting. A table surrounded by several stately-looking gentlemen and one woman greeted her from far off.<p>

"Generals," she said with a respectful bow.

They each returned a nod, one (though she didn't catch which) saying "General Juniper. Are we ready?"

"We are, sirs. The enemy formations will never be in a better position."

"I've sent the orders to my bombers," the Unity Nation general said flatly. "I'm glad to finally bring this conflict to an end."

"With all due respect, sir, don't jinx it."

Several of the generals chuckled and the Unity replied with a chuckle of his own, "Duly noted, general. You should be seeing the escorts shortly."

Fighters, clearly UN, screamed over her head, intercepting Scythe's and butchering those of the tyrant in a short exchange of missiles. She grinned toothily as the fighters settled into wide circles, like so many vultures. There was a loud droning as a single bomber, with two additional escorts, flew overheard at level with the clouds. A speck descended from the bomber. The speck grew continually larger. At last she could see that it was an atomic bomb of UN manufacture.

The fins and gently sloping curves of the massive ordinance became clearer and clearer as the bomb became quite uncomfortably closer. Juniper was about ten miles away on a hill overlooking the forest, but she still felt uneasy seeing the ordinance fall. Just before it reached the treetops, it detonated. There was a massive burst of blue through her sunglasses. The cover was stripped off the trees, lapped by blue flame. Below that, Wolves stood in confusion, wondering what had just happened to them, realizing that they had been released from the bondage of control spells.

Juniper grinned at the thought that the scene was being repeated at other points all along the battlefront and, better yet, in the capital, where Scythe's closest advisers would no doubt have him overthrown in short order. She could taste victory.

It was sweet.

* * *

><p>Scythe looked out the window. Was that an aurora? At this time of day and this central of a latitude? Never. It sure looked like one, though.<p>

"What is that?" He asked the empty air outside the window he was leaning out of. It faded from the air, replaced by an ascending blue cloud. Scythe leaned back inside his large, red-draped office. He stepped out into the small adjoining office of his secretary. "Did you see that?"

"See what?" The small wolf asked, looking over the rims of his slim spectacles.

"That's right, you don't have a window in here."

"That lack of sunlight is likely why I feel so crappy all the time," he returned flatly as he got back to his paperwork. He suddenly paused in shock, "Did I just say that out loud?"

"You did," Scythe said with an equal measure of shock. "Are your control spells still in place?"

"Let's check," he said with a growl, reaching toward his belt. He suddenly jerked his hand up from it, a standard issue Wolf Army pistol in paw. The barrel of which was pointed directly at Scythe's head. The secretary's muzzle lit up and twisted into an evil grin, "Nope. Out the door. Now."

"Like you would shoot me!" Scythe said, refusing to budge.

"You give me one good reason not to. The only reason I have right now is mercy, and I assure you that that is running thin right about now. So go."

Scythe dutifully obeyed, though he didn't bother to hide the growl that rose to his throat. It only made his secretary grin wider, which irked Scythe to a point. Not that it much mattered. Many had called Scythe a fool before. He wasn't fool enough not to recognize that he was done for, that his reign was over.

* * *

><p>Juniper heard her helmet's comm stone beep to indicate that she was about to receive a message. A voice she recognized as that of her former colonel—now a Four Star General— "Our agents in the city report that the king's own secretary has captured him in the name of the United Wolf People's Socialist Republic. Scythe is being forced to issue orders to remove the control spells of those forces we couldn't reach. The war is over, comrade, the war is over. We are victorious!"<p>

Juniper let just a bit of her self-control go, let some of her instinct come out in the form of a howl. She found that, as the message moved down the chain of command, howls emerged from the throats of the whole battlefield. It was over. Finally. All her strife and toil, her work on both sides of the field, had finally paid off. Right about then was when she realized that she was still on visual comm stone with the USA BoG. Composing herself, she straightened back to attention, "Sorry. Scythe is being held captive by UWPSR-loyal forces; King's servants released from their spells by the atomic bomb air burst over the capitol. Scythe has been forced to release all who still remain under a control spell. It is over."

The only figure seated around the conference table Juniper recognized, the USAF representative, spoke, "Well done, Juniper. You and your people have prevailed for the right. Keep up the good fight."

* * *

><p>The talking between the generals continued for some time before the feed with Juniper was finally cut off and the meeting adjourned. Amber was still reflecting on just how much of the instinctual nature of Keidrans still remained in their bodies, as evidenced by Juniper's rather savage sounding howl. The other generals didn't view it as out of the norm, but more so rude and showing a lack of self-control—like she'd broken a law of etiquette, not like she'd gone insane or was strange. Amber shrugged it off and decided it something over which to ponder later. In the meantime, the Dog general was very anxious to speak to her.<p>

"What is this limited monarchy you speak of?" He asked promptly.

"Just what it sounds. It's a monarch whose power is limited by a congress or parliament—whatever you want to call it. It's a group of representatives for the people who make sure that the monarch isn't too powerful. The king can either be separate or have only one vote or even only able to act as a mediator; depends on how it's set up. There's usually a constitution and bill of rights attached. Nothing too complicated, preferably."

The Dog nodded, its ears laid back in what Amber suspected was contemplation. "Should we manage to arrange a meeting with the rioters, would you mediate?"

"If at all possible, I will. I have a BoG comm stone; it'll get in contact with me anytime I'm on this world. If I don't respond, you know where I am. I'll do my best to get back with you."

"Thank you so much, Captain Finney. You have no idea what a help this is to my King and my people."

"I only do my best, sir," she said, nodded and turned away. She worked her way through the maze of corridors out to the helipad. Joe leaned up against a small white dragon waiting on her. "Waiting on me already? You are getting serious about this," she said with a grin once she'd gotten near him.

Amber heard a feminine voice, and she swore it was the dragon's as its head came around to face the two of them,_ "There something I need to know about here?"_

"Nothing, Nora," Joe said, facing the dragon's head. He turned his attention to Amber. "Just want to know what the Dog says. I like to know everything I can."

"He wants me to moderate between the rioters and the government. Nothing more, nothing less."

Joe nodded, "Fair enough. That tells me just how bad the riots are getting, though. The Dog have kept a tight lid on this one, declared a no-fly zone and the whole nine yards."

"Satellite reconnaissance?"

"What is _that_?"

Amber shrugged, "Nevermind."

"Oh! Before I forget," he said, turning around and reaching into a saddlebag.

He pulled out a book and handed it to her. She took it, finding it to be leather bound with gold inlaid letters on the front reading _The Outsider. _"What is it about?" she asked as she flipped open the first page.

"It's a book written by a former Templar General, Oliver Lambert. He knew and traveled with The Great Lane. He wrote this book only a few years after the Lanes settled in Fox territory. It is considered the ultimate reference on The Great Lanes. That is an exact copy of the original edition. I thought your superiors might be happy to have it."

On the first page, she found a map, which she studied for a second. It had the point of Lane's arrival marked, along with a trail and points indicating where certain events had occurred. There was a second dotted trail which crossed General Lane's that ended in a question mark labeled _Aaron and Lia's Path? (Exact location and dates unknown) _Amber disregarded that and started looking for borders, to compare them with the modern ones. She found that they were very similar, though Unity nation had obviously been added and the Human Republic had shrunken considerably after the fall of the empire. Then she discovered a nation labeled _Cat Clans. _"There are Cat Keidran?" she asked Joe. "I've never seen any."

"There were," he said and climbed onto the dragon. "I'll explain later. Right now, I have an appointment with the Humans."

For a second, Amber thought the statement absurd; she'd forgotten that Joe was, in fact not human. She shrugged and jumped into her F-35, starting it up and taking off vertically. Was there such a thing as adjusting to the world too much? _I don't think so, _she thought as she vectored the fighter towards the growing USAF outpost near Lyn'knol.

A few minutes later, over the landing strip, she brought the nimble little aircraft into a vertical landing, shutting it down and jumping out of the cockpit. Ground teams scrambled out to take care of the aircraft. Suddenly, they all froze in place. Everything was absolutely silent. Amber had never heard such silence... It was palpable... Incredible. Stifling.

Then there was a voice. A voice unlike any other. "I am Ephemural," it said.

Amber instinctively had her sidearm drawn before she was conscious of the fact.

"Oh, you mortals from Earth are all alike!" the voice said. "Your General did the same to me when we first met."

Amber swiveled around on both heels, keeping the gun drawn. "What are you? Where are you? Show yourself!" she demanded, not letting the fear and panic in her heart set into her voice.

A mask appeared floating in front of her. "You are in no position to make demands, mortal, but I will if you insist. And put that primitive weapon away. Have you not seen that time is frozen? Its projectile will never leave the barrel, nor will the hammer strike the primer!"

Accepting this, Amber holstered the 9mm pistol.

"As to what I am, I am a demigod. Made by the God you know to look after this world. To be easier on your tongue, call me what the locals do; Neutral. That name does not reflect on my purpose of course, for mortals like you invented it."

"And just what do you want from me?" Amber asked, letting a little agitation slip into her voice. She needn't show her fear.

"Almost what I wanted from your general," it said.

Amber raised an eyebrow.

"I wanted him to take command of an army; you'll find this in that book you're about to read, to keep the three races balanced. This was a lie. I wanted him to believe that my name had some reflection on what I wanted. All I wanted was for him to give the Keidran a chance to gain the advantage over the Humans. He gave me quite the opposite for some time. Finally, though, after his death, really, I got what I asked for, but not what I wanted. This world has hung in the balance for a thousand years, the divine game frozen, waiting for something, anything, to break that dreadful balance."

"And I am that thing?"

"Not quite," it said hollowly. "The Wolf riots did that, replaced that fool of a tyrant with a competent, strong government who looks after its people. You, my lady, are what I need to rid this world of a pestilence I'm afraid I put here—the Unities."

"What?" Amber asked, shocked.

"You see," the mask said, floating around her, "I created the Unites to ensure that there was at least _some _Keidran blood left in this world. I didn't know that ol' Curt would ensure that that happened, anyhow. So, ever since, the Unites have become a bit of a... Nuisance. To whom do they belong? Me? Evil? I see the best solution as exterminating them, putting the Divine Game back to its original state."

"And why, or for that matter, how, would I do this?" Amber asked.

"It's simple," it said, "Wear me as a mask."

"How about no?" Amber said smugly. If the thing needed her, it wouldn't harm her.

"Then drop an atomic bomb on Legacy City yourself."

"No again."

"I'll kill you."

"Fine, do it. I know where I'm going," she said, gripping the cross strapped to her dog tags and hoping the thing wouldn't.

"I'll kill your little boyfriend."

"You were going to have me kill him anyway, if I recall."

"Who said you had to kill him? He can return with you to your world."

"My dead world? No thank you. You can go to Hell for all I care; you're not getting me to do anything. I've finally found a place—a whole world—that makes me happy. I'm not going to ruin it now. You may have convinced General Lane to help you, but you have no such leverage over me."

She suddenly felt more alive as she realized that the thing was gone and that the ground crews were once again swarming around her aircraft like so many ants working intently on their given tasks. She sighed as she resolved to report this finding to both Joseph and her commanders.

* * *

><p>Joe nodded slowly as Amber told him about her encounter with Neutral. "So Neutral wants to rid of Unity nation?"<p>

"No, it wants to rid of Unites on this world altogether."

"For one, you can call it by its proper name, you know. It's called Mekkan. For two, why?"

"You seem to be creating an issue in its 'divine game.' It and the god that is over the Humans seem to have a bit of a territorial dispute over y'all."

Joe scratched at his beard—he hadn't shaven that day—in thought. "Then why on Mekkan did she let us exist?"

"Because it thought that the Keidran were going to cease to exist. It was hoping that General Lane would postpone the inevitable. Instead, he prevented it from happening entirely. Ever since, you Unities and your revolutionary ideas of equality have been a heckuva issue for them. Always meddling in their dealings in the divine game. A fifteen hundred year balance was apparently too much for them to endure. The Wolf Dog and Tiger riots seem to have been quite a relief for them—a return to the game."

"Well, then we need to find a way to rather disappoint them."

Amber nodded. "Question remains; how?"

Joe smiled that mischievously, "Knowin' the two of us, we'll find a way."

Their USABoG Comm stones buzzed simultaneously. They grabbed them off their belts. Once they contacted their skin, the stones started in a frantic announcement from the Tiger general. He sounded rather out of breath, "Generals! The King... He's going to use atomic bombs to stop the riot... he's evacuating loyalists from all rioting cities and having bomber crews... prep with atomic bombs. I beg you, for the sake of all my people, help us!" The message terminated. Joe's mouth was agape and he could feel that his ears and tail were lax. Amber's jaw had dropped, too, he realized.

Joe closed his mouth and felt his whole body tense instinctively as he concentrated. He needed to scramble fighters. Shoot down all military air traffic in Tiger Nation. An assault force needed to take the palace before the king himself could leave. His fighters would take thirty minutes to launch. That was a problem. What could launch faster? _Dragons,_ he thought. He jumped to action, bolting off his couch, heading for his upstairs. About halfway up the stairs, he realized that Amber was still sitting on his couch. He motioned for her to come along with him. She snapped out of her trance-like state and ran after him. He kept thumping up the stairs, her right behind him. The upstairs of his spacious eastern plateau home was a tactical readiness room. He touched various flat community stones, built into the table and arranged like piano keys. His fingers flew across them as he activated the channels over which he wanted to talk. He then touched the central stone and begun to speak, "This is General Lane calling all dragons in service of Unity nation. The day you have waited for for so very long has come. Tiger Kingdom is preparing to drop atomic weapons on its own citizens. You are to shoot down any Tiger military traffic in that nation that refuses to stand down. Civilian traffic is to be cleared, but that is a secondary objective."

He waited for his responses. There were plenty. Unity Nation had about thirty dragons it kept on standby and another thirty that were loyal to it. He got a good many replies from both categories, about 43 in total, he guessed. He removed his palm from the central stone and began tapping the various channel stones again, working them like some fine instrument, the beautiful symphony of warfare. Chatter was beginning to light up the channels, too. Other UN forces had overheard his transmission to the dragons.

Finally, the various UN military channels were selected, "All UN forces, this is General Lane. Tiger Kingdom is preparing to use atomic bombs on its own citizens, a direct violation of USA terms. We cannot allow this atrocity to occur. The congress will act far too slow to be of any good. We must act now, Unities! All fighters in sector five are to scramble and assist the dragons in their work securing a no-fly zone over Tiger territory. All Tiger military air traffic that refuses to stand down must be shot down. Civilian traffic is to be cleared from the area. UAVs are to run the plates of all vehicles going in and out of the rioting cities. Any vehicles tied to the regime refusing to halt are to be destroyed. All military vehicles refusing to stand down are to be dealt with in the same manner. Airborne Shock Troopers are to take the palace and any other government buildings of note."

His fingers began to fly over the channel stones again, but Amber sat a hand on his shoulder to interrupt him. He swiveled in his chair to look at her, an ear raised, waiting for an explanation of the interruption to his important business. "What can I do to help?" She asked.

"If you can scramble your fighters, Lyn'knol's _verdammt _close to the Tigers."

"Got it," she said. "And I'm going to get in my fighter and help personally."

"Okay, Nora and I will be along shortly thereafter. Let me make a transmission of my actions to the other generals," he responded and got back to work as she scrambled out of the room.

He finished the transmission in short order and scrambled up to the roof of his spacious house. He thought he was going to have a good day; though Amber'd came to his house to tell him about Neutral's latest doings, he'd convinced her to stay for supper. _There goes that, _he thought as he finished his climb up the stairs. Nora waited for him, already in her armor, on the roof.

"_There goes our day off," _she said as he mounted her in his typical bravado manner.

"Par for the course," Joe said, watching Amber's aircraft take off. He and Nora were right behind her for a bit, before she got up to uberschall speeds.

"_Say, what was she doing at your _house, _anyhow, Joe?"_

"The gods seem to be stirred up again. Apparently, she had an encounter with Neutral. She wanted to tell me about it before she went to her own superiors; I can give her background knowledge and such, you know."

"_Makes sense, anyhow," _Nora said. _"You really like her, though, don't you?"_

"Now is no time for that, Nora," he responding, hoping that the red he was turning didn't show under his unshaven beard. A Unity's beard was a bit more covering than a Human's.

"_It's not that covering, Joe." _

"Stop reading my mind! That's not right!"

"_You should use more mental shielding."_

"My lack of magical prowess is not up for debate here, Nora. Yes, I happen to like her. Is that a problem?"

"_No,"_ she relinquished.

"Thank you. You know as well as I do that what we had couldn't've lasted."

"_I beg to differ," _the beast said.

"I do believe my opinion is just as important here," he said flatly.

"_And mine is not?"_

"It is, but we can't do what we did if I don't agree to it, so you're just going to have to live with that. I've had to move on, Nora. Now is no time to be lost in a past we can't change."

She didn't respond, but Joe knew her well enough to tell that she was moping. He shrugged mentally. He reached his hands around Nora's neck a little farther, forcing him to grip her hug-like. Was it just him or had she moved her necklace of comm stones a little lower on purpose? Judging by the sly dragon-smile that was creeping across her face, she had. He rolled his eyes and started working the tiles of magically-enhanced stone anyway. The array under Nora's neck was just as complex as the one in his tactical readiness room. Nora was his command post. "Dragons, how are we looking?"

There were a couple different replies. Civilian traffic was getting in the way of taking down military traffic, and dragons were forced to identify targets by sight. Joe responded by narrowing efforts to grounding air bases and sealing cities off from air and ground traffic. Joe's plan was to keep the Tigers from shipping an atomic bomb in and evacuating the king and essential personnel from cities. Joe didn't think they were cruel enough to kill their own people. But there was still that possibility. He shivered a bit, though he was by no means cold.

He took in a deep breath. In the past few months, he'd fought his first war. But this seemed different. This one was now or never. "Nora, where are we?"

"Just passed the Tiger border. Should be coming up on Atlanta shortly."

Joe squinted and could just see the reflection off the glass buildings of a large city. Above it circled two black specs. Suddenly, a third spec appeared, racing far faster than the circling specs. The circling specs suddenly changed directions. Faint lines of blue, purple and orange carved across the sky, going from the smaller, slower specs to the larger. There were responses of orange streaks going from the larger faster speck towards the smaller specs. One of the smaller specs suddenly dropped towards the ground. Curt cursed and watched the other spec, which began to emit even more blue and purple lines, carving the sky up outright.

Suddenly, an even smaller spec fell from the larger one. Joe cursed and grabbed Nora's neck, forcing her to face the other way before the flash. She righted herself once it had gone and they looked in shock at the remnants of Atlanta. Nora slowed suddenly and Joe felt himself to go into shock. He shook the fog from around him and started working the comm stones again. But his fingers didn't fly like they should have. His mind didn't work quite straight, either. Slowly, though, he got a status report. Slowly, he reported the news to the other generals and the rest of his forces. Never would he get over seeing thousands of lives end in a flash. Unity Nation fighters from before the arrival of plans from Earth soared past him, missiles shooting from their wings after the spec responsible for the devastation of Atlanta. The spec vanished in a burst of orange. There was some satisfaction to that prospect, but nearly enough to make up for it.

* * *

><p>UNAF Lieutenant Kelly Youngston-Lane checked over his maschinenpistole over as the transport shot over the Tiger-UN border. His lieutenant had been killed in the combat in Wolf Kingdom and his superiors decided that he should be the one to replace the deceased officer. It seemed officers with true combat experience were in short supply. He put his helmet on his head, pulling his ears through the slots in it and moving them around a bit, making sure he could hear. He adjusted his body armor, which had been improved with experience from the battles at the Wolf missile silos. He took in a deep breath and watched the lights on the wall of the compartment. The red one came on.<p>

The Unities stood up and spread out around the floor of the compartment. They began their incantations, which had been shortened and improved since the Wolf silos. The green light came on. Kelly took a breath in. The doors opened and Kelly felt himself fall. It was a familiar sensation, though the cityscape around the palace made it much more dangerous than usual. Also a factor was that the palace would have a highly reinforced roof and walls. They were aiming for a large panorama window on the front of the king's office. His squadrons were right beside him and behind him as they clashed with the thick glass and hit the floor. They stood up and ran to cover as they drew their weapons. The office was completely empty of beings. The doors at the end of it looked suspiciously trapped.

"Dean, on that door," Kelly called.

Judging by the look on the new sergeant's face, he had considered making a dirty joke about that command. Kelly was rather glad he refrained; he didn't want to chastise his best noncom and friend. Dean ran up to the door and ran a glowing hand over it. He shrugged, "I see no traps but a week's salary says that there's an ambush waiting for us behind that door."

Kelly nodded in agreement with the assessment. "Blow it open; we'll play it by ear."

Dean nodded and grinned his usual toothy grin. C4 was planted around the hinges and latch of the door shortly thereafter. "Everyone back!" Kelly called and dove behind the prominent office desk. There was a deafening explosion and a rattle of fire from the hallway.

"The Stripies ain't never been in combat, I see," one of the privates muttered.

Kelly had to agree with the assessment. _What a waste of a good ambush,_ he thought and shrugged _(I ain't complaining, though)_ as he pulled the pin from a grenade. It made a satisfying clink on the marble floor of the grand hallway. It made an equally satisfying explosion. The shrieks in the hallway were more blood-curdling than satisfying, but they were a part of the symphony of combat. His men charged into the hall following the chaos the grenade set off. _Got a group of good men this time 'round, _he thought as he reached for the comm. stone in his helmet. "Alright, we're clear for squads three and four" he said and turned to face the shattered panorama windows behind him. Somewhere just beyond the horizon, _Schwarzen Adlen _and their escorts were breaking holding pattern and headed for the palace. The escorts soon appeared in the clouded sky. Missiles preceded their arrival, some directed for the ground, others the sky above the palace. Kelly shook his head. What had Unity Nation got itself into this time?

The stealth transports were somewhere above the thick cloud cover, though Kelly never saw them. The twenty men they dropped, however, he did see. They plummeted just as his squadron had, and went straight through the windows, slamming hard into and cracking the reinforced floor.

"Circle up!" Kelly called. All the men in the platoon gathered around him. The operation being multi-branch, it used UNA organization. "Alright," he told them, "our mission is to secure the palace, but just our platoon will never be able to do it. Our first objectives are to secure this floor and the roof so regular paratroopers can land. The rest of our special forces are tied up taking down missile silos. First and second squads, you are to secure this floor. Third and fourth squads, on me, we're taking the roof. Unity!"

"Unity!" they echoed. It was a cheer that didn't offend any of the branches involved in the operation. They broke up and went their separate ways. A map of the palace overlaid itself on his helmet's visor. He led the second group of arrivals to the roof access. The door was pretty well concealed, for reasons beyond Kelly. It was unlocked. Privates filed into the stairwell single file. The roof door was locked, but it could be unlocked and opened from the inside. The private at the top of the stairs stopped and looked back a Kelly. He nodded and motioned the young Unity, who seemed to have a bit of Arctic Wolf in him, on. He unlocked the door and kicked it open rapidly. He charged out of it, followed by the rest of the two squadrons. No fire greeted them. By the time Kelly's position in the line came up, the men were fairly walking onto the roof.

"Don't stop," Kelly said, "take up cover. Something is up here." _Literally and figuratively, _he thought as a UN fighter zipped overhead, firing missiles at an escaping Tiger hubschrauber_. _Tiger fighters swooped in close from the south and returned fire with maschinengewhere and cannon. The Unity machines banked hard to face them, returning fire with their revolving cannon. The older Tiger machines, those from the time before The Great Lanes appeared, were no match for their modern Unity counterparts.

Kelly forced himself to focus on his present situation. He was crouched behind a chimney on the roof of the ancient Tiger Palace. It was far too quiet for a battlefield. There was clattering in the distance, but nowhere near Kelly and his men. _Something is... off... about it, _he thought. He didn't like the feeling he got at all. Suddenly, form the other side of the massive compound's roof, a flare went up. Something was off about it, too (for one, why were the Tigers launching a flare in the daytime?). The flare exploded and suddenly all was black. The very sun was blotted out. Kelly had never seen so dark a night.

But he didn't have time to think about that. It was no longer quiet. The Tigers were firing now. Kelly took in a deep breath and began the incantation for the most complex spell he knew.

_Solemn comfort of fire be,_

_The Power, oh, darkness to see,_

_Into the depths of night peer_

_So seen is evil's mighty sneer_

Kelly felt raw power, glowing orange and burning hot, roll down his arms and pool in the palms of his hands, overflowing and spilling. It tickled his fingers and poured down onto the roof. His mind became sharp. His thoughts were instantly and suddenly focused, his vision crystalline. He grasped the energy and flung it into the air, guiding it with his new found mental clarity. The flair was vanquished and day—light—returned. But Kelly was by no means finished. He left his cover for broad day. Enemies were highlighted in his vision.

A Tiger behind a chimney jumped up to fire at Kelly. Kelly pulled energy from the bricks in the roof and swallowed the Tiger with the power. Another Tiger behind him thought he had the drop on Kelly. It was quite the other way around. The Tiger was knocked clean off the roof by a toss of the energy in Kelly's hand. On a faraway rooftop, a sniper fired at him. He saw the intent far before the bullet left the gun. A hand with manna clinging to its palm was raised in a shield. The bullet slammed into the puddle of refined manna much like it might do if it were water—and water happens to be very good at stopping bullets.

"Mannafire," Kelly said under his breath. The manna he harnessed made the manna used to accelerate the bullet catch fire. The fire shot back up the path of the bullet and exploded on the sniper's gun. Kelly grinned toothily and let the bullet drop. A Tiger jumped out from behind another brick chimney. Kelly shot a bolt of glowing golden energy at him.

The Tiger deflected it with a somewhat advanced shield, looking rather bored. "I see you have a very good grasp on Fire's Comfort. That is a very advanced spell. There are more advanced, you know.

"_Fire's Fury my soul fill_

_Give to me your ill will_

_Fire's soothing warmth prevail_

_Fill my soul with your harnessed Hell_

_Dragon's wings to me give_

_So that in darkness I may live…"_

Kelly stood in amazement as the Tiger went on with the incantation. For one, Kelly wondered, why did a Keidran need such a sophisticated incantation? They drew their manna from pre-concentrated crystals, so they didn't need spells that drew manna to them. Fire's Comfort was designed to pull manna from fired bricks, like those in the palace roof; a highly refined and complex sort of manna. A manna that was already almost fire.

Kelly didn't know what the Keidran's spell was. It sounded like an older spell. Fire's comfort was designed in the 1800s, after the Templar Towers were destroyed, so humans could have more powerful spells without manna reserves and without being forced to resort to dark magic. The Tiger's spell seemed far more... primitive. Savage. Kelly saw red dragons begin to grow from the Tiger's back. His eyes opened a bit more and his clarified state of mind realized that soldiers from both sides had come into the open to watch. Neither side was fighting. Kelly drew in a deep breath and pulled the fiery manna into the palms of both his hands. With a sudden movement, he brought his arms in front of him and slammed them together. The manna ignited from the compression. Kelly brought it to his lips and breathed, _"ignis spiritus." _The fire shot from his cupped hands for the Tiger. A transparent red dragon lunged for it, blocking it and dissipating. Kelly let a low, primitive growl out. Two of the dragons shot out from their Hydra-like bobbing position and towards Kelly. _"Clipeum ignis!" _he shouted and rapidly formed the correlating motions. A glowing orange circle with ornate writing along its edges appeared in front of him. One of the red dragons hit it and dissipated. The other skirted it and sunk dark magic teeth into his left arm. He let out a fair roar, pushing the manna to the edge of his right hand. He chopped at the dragon's head and it too dissipated. The final dragon was pulled back into its caster's body.

Clenching his arm, Kelly tried to figure out what the Keidran was doing. Kelly was desperately attempting to heal the wound. The black magic seemed to prevent that from happening. He gritted his teeth and waited for the Tiger's next move. With his still crystal vision, he saw the black gathering at the Tiger's claw tips. Kelly nodded and formed his plan. He pooled his fiery manna into his hands and waited. The Tiger lunged and charged. Kelly stood firm.

The Tiger swung its dark-magic tipped claws at him. Kelly blocked just below the wrist on its right hand and grabbed its left arm, letting Fire's Comfort set the flat black uniform on fire as he slung the Keidran. Kelly followed the motion through, swinging to face the Tiger that was now on fire. His maschinenpistole was suddenly in his hands and lead was suddenly flying into his enemies' back. He ended the spell and instantly felt himself brittle and collapsing onto the brick roof. But he'd done it. He'd won... He'd... wo...


	5. Chapter V  Part One

This chapter will be short because I am pushing it out rapidly (or rapidly for college exam time), so that I can attach this author's note about The Outsider Lost Chapters, which I am writing entirely in character. No author's notes from me, only Judith Lane. I will be publishing BPT and TOLC at the same time; one chapter of each followed by another (BPT, TOLC, BPT, TOLC and so on). You'll see the reason for this at the end of both.

To recap, this chapter short because of exams and a desire to get this note out soon. I have also split it into two parts because it's just too short for a chapter.

That said (and trying not to sound too pompous), the fifth chapter of the worldwide epic, Burning Paper Tigers. Enjoy.

* * *

><p>USAF Captain Amber Finney shot over a foreign battlefield, and not for the first time in her life. Though this battlefield was foreign in <em>every <em>sense of the word. She was quite used to flying over countries other than her own. But worlds other than her own against fighters she'd never seen before? Not so much.

She had just sped over the Tiger border and her radar and IFF told her she was one of only a few USA craft over the nation. Besides her were two USAF F-35s, four Bastian and two Human Republic fighters, along with six UN dragons and two UNAF built F-22s. One of the UN dragons was quite close to her. Using the comm. stones she'd had installed in her ship, she contacted it. "Unity Nation dragon, this is Captain Finney of the United States Air Force. It seems we could both use a wing man."

"Alright, then, on my tail, try to keep up. I'm going to try and ground the nearest air base I run into."

Amber grinned, "A challenge? I accept."

"I've never met a fighter pilot who could keep up with me."

"Maybe that will change today."

She could almost hear a snide grin on the dragon's face, "Perhaps. Half of me hopes so."

With that, Amber pushed the stick forward, feeling the nimble craft nose downward. She used her radar to find the dragon on the horizon, then maneuvered behind it using her Mark One Eyeball. No matter how outdated that million-something year-old tool was, she still preferred it to the most state-of-the-art electronic tools. No matter how good those electronic things got, she suspected she would prefer the old way to do things anyway. That seemed to suit this world just fine, too. Its air technology seemed to have been stuck permanently somewhere in the 1980s. At least, it had been before the USAF arrived. Now some nations were up to 2010, at least. On the ground, they'd been stuck in an interesting mix of the 40s and 80s, their tanks using 80mm cannon with thin armor while their APCs used, like modern APCs, machine gun turrets and antitank missiles. It was an interesting world. Magic played with things, too. Perhaps, with magic, their tanks were up to modern standards. Perhaps. How on Earth (Mekkan?) could Amber ever know?

She decided it didn't matter and that she had better get back to thinking about reality. She found herself right on the great dragon's tail. It was flying no more than a few hundred feet above the ground, at something like 700kph, which wasn't much above her F-35's stall speed. Nonetheless, she could handle the speed.

"What is your name, dragon, and where are we heading?"

"Call me Charlemagne. We are heading to a Tiger airbase not far from here. We plan to lay waste to it, to try and prevent them from launching another atomic bomb."

Amber nodded. "Okay. Targeting large bombers, I assume?"

"Indeed."

"Are we to spare other personnel?"

"Bombers are merely a priority. If it moves, it dies."

Was it just Amber or did this dragon have some kind of grudge against the Tigers? There was certainly something in his voice that implied a wanting for their blood. Amber decided she'd best ignore that and do what the dragon said-the Tigers seemed to be very dangerous enemies. Their technology was up almost up to par with the UN-and was only behind because the UN had been faster to adopt the Earth technologies Amber and her team had been sending over. She briefly wondered how that UN technology was affecting the USA back home, how the mages were doing in China.

It was about then that she realized she was piloting a multi-million dollar aircraft and that she needed to be more careful. She brought herself back level and used the rudder to make her heading more nearly match the dragon's. _Really need to pay more attention,_ she thought. As if to underscore that, her cockpit lit up with red lights and alarms hollered. SAMs were headed for her and Charlemagne. She cursed and slid the throttle up to full in a quick and fluid action. She shot over Charlemagne, feeling the acceleration punch her back into her seat and pulled back on the stick, hoping to gain some altitude before her evasion systems kicked in. She could already see her ECM systems cycling bands. Flares and chaff had been put on standby. She recalled that thirty or forty years ago, pilots had had to cycle the bands and trigger the countermeasures automatically. When performing high-G avoidance maneuvers, that wasn't exactly what one called easy.

The red blinking stopped and the screaming sirens faded. The missiles shot by her with several meters to spare. She sighed, cutting the throttle and making a tall loop over herself, again falling in behind the majestic-looking brown dragon covered with flat black armor that was no doubt radar-absorbing. She noticed that the dragon now neatly gripped a SAM missile in each of its four clawed hands. Amber grinned. _Dragon knows how to fight, sure 'nuff,_ she thought.

"You've done this before," she stated over the radio.

"Indeed," the beast responded. "I've been fighting for Unity Nation since well before it was a nation. General Lane was on my back when he revolutionized air combat. I was almost killed in that one. I served in the war with the Human Empire for years. I fought for the Cats in their war with the Tigers when General Lane was killed."

"War with the Cats? General Lane killed?"

"That's a history lesson I'll save for another time, ma'am. As for now, we're approaching that airbase."

Another set of alarms announcing missiles headed her way told Amber that they were indeed nearing the Tiger airbase. This time, her radar informed her that they were from aircraft-a flight of four Tiger fighters, TSF-15s if her IFF system was to be trusted. She assumed that it was to be trusted and put a lock on the westmost in the formation, letting a radar guided missile fly. It was only after the missile had left that she realized the enemy missiles had all lost their locks on her and headed for the ground or the sun. She nodded to herself. They were stuck in the eighties when it came to air combat, sure enough. Lessons at the Academy had taught her that early versions of the Sidewinder had been prone to locking onto bogus heat sources like the sun. She saw her missile impact the enemy fighter. Her missiles were much better. Suddenly, she noticed a missile that had clearly locked onto her, but she'd gotten no warning alarm. _Magic missile! _she thought with shock. Her avoidance systems couldn't do _anything _against that.

"Charlemagne, a little help, if you would."

"Standby."

There was a bright blue flash and a blue ring emanated from the beast. The missile lost its bearing and careened off. Amber breathed a sigh of relief and launched her second missile. The Tiger tried to evade it, but rather in vain.

Suddenly, the dragon twisted in air, putting its whole body into the toss of one of the SAMs it held. The missile flew. Before she could see it impact, the dragon twisted again, launching the second. They both made their targets with remarkable precision. _He's definitely done this before, _Amber thought with awe and some respectful fear. Her radar detected that more Tiger fighters were taking off. Charlemagne accelerated, his whole body going into the motion of each and every beat of his wings. Amber realized why. More than fighters were taking off. Two dragons rose from the tarmac of the enemy airfield. Amber decided that speeding up was likely in her best interest, as well, pushing the throttle all the way up. She couldn't win in a game of chicken against the dragon, of course, but she fully intended to make it think she could. She locked a heat-seeking missile on the dragon (which had a very hot throat) and fired.

Amber discovered the source of the dragon's hot throat as it bellowed fire, disintegrating the missile. She cursed and decided to wait for cannon range, setting the automatic cannon pipper to track the beast's throat. She came in range. Pressed the trigger. An amber-tinted line of lead emitted from the left side of the cockpit, boring into the beast's throat before it had a chance to do much of anything. The dragon's head and body fell to the ground separately as Amber's fighter streaked over it. She punched the left rudder into the floor and then rapidly banked the aircraft the same direction, thrust vectoring systems kicking in and whipping her aircraft around in a radius of feet. Charlemagne and the enemy dragon, painted with tiger stripes, were engaged in a duel to the death. The pipper couldn't gain a lock for anything. Amber didn't want to hit Charlemagne, either.

"Charlemagne, you got this? There ain't much I can do."

"Take care of those fighters. I have this son of a.." he was cut off by a distinctive biting sound. Amber once again whipped her aircraft around, setting a lock on all the enemy fighters in the air and ripple-firing the rest of her missiles, taking all of the enemies down within seconds. She let two of her eight Small Diameter Bombs trash an enemy runway as she streaked over it. She flipped a switch and her aircraft went into hover mode, decelerating and the computer taking over the throttle. She sighted a row of fighters and bombers taking off on the other runway. She pressed the trigger in, hearing the deafening roar of the 30mm cannon. The yellow stream of lead reappeared beside the cockpit, connecting with and destroying the orange-striped aircraft in a hot series of explosions and flames lapping the tarmac. Two more SDBs trashed that runway as well, effectively shutting the airfield down.

She noticed Charlemagne, his armor charred, in pieces, scales burned or dripping blood, flew up and started hovering beside her. "You need to head back to" - she almost said 'get repairs' - "heal, Charlemagne?"

"Yeah, one last thing first," the noble beast reported in a tired and wounded voice. It flew over to, and ripped the roof off of, a building, grabbing the scattering personnel. It dropped all of them but one and started on its course home. Amber escorted the majestic wounded dragon until UN aircraft took over the job for her.

* * *

><p>Axe surveyed the situation table in what had been Scythe's palace. It was now The People's Palace, home to the People's Party of the UWPSR. Contained in its basement was a situation room Scythe's Generals had only had to use once. The table had a three-dimensional manna projector embedded in it, and it currently displayed the Tiger Kingdom. There were three bright white dots on it, cities destroyed in atomic fire. There was one blue dot on it, as well, the Tiger capital, which had been captured by USA forces. Grey and Blue dots soared this way and that over it, representing UWPSR and USA fighters and support aircraft, respectively. Other blue dots, and a constantly shifting blue line, occupied the ground, representing USA ground forces (which were mostly UN at this point).<p>

"I don't like being involved in this," one of Axe's generals (he didn't catch which) said.

"No," Axe said, "neither do I, but if it helps us into the USA, I'm all for it. That is, more or less, our ticket into recovering this war-torn country."

The general let out a gruff sigh of a growl. "I see the concept, but is it worth it in practice? The people did not like Scythe when he started meddling in world politics. They thought he was better off to sell our bounty of Liquid Manna and stay out of the affairs of the world."

"Isolationism is a policy we can no longer afford, comrade. If our nation is to survive, we need to be actively involved in politics. Look at the Arctics and Basitians. Because they refuse to interact with the world, they are left hopelessly outdated and behind the times." Axe was both blunt and remorseful. He did not like getting involved in the world any more than his men did.

"Then gentlemen, let us take a pause from the activities of the world. We need to address what to do with the Royal Family," General Holgar asked.

"They are already in exile in their winter home at the Arctic's border. What more need we do with them?" General Juniper asked.

Axe rubbed the large and thick moustache-like crop of hair he grew right over his mouth, "Well, so long as there is royal blood, there will be people who call for the King and Queen to be in power. There is only one solution that I can see. End the bloodline."

Juniper seemed slightly taken aback. "Comrade," she said, "Are we no better than him?"

"He's enough blood on his hands that it is just."

"But his family? They deserve a trial."

"They'll get none," Holgar said. "My men will receive the signal soon."

Juniper didn't appear to be happy with that thought, but she'd been a soldier long enough to keep her mouth shut. She'd better keep that attitude, too.

* * *

><p>A guard came into Queen Naomi's chamber. That was nothing out of the ordinary. What was out of the ordinary was that he told her to dress very nicely. She did, very obediently. The soldier explained, "We're going to get a family photo of the royal family, for propaganda purposes."<p>

_You mean to make a mockery out of us, _Naomi thought. She didn't comment out loud, nor did she really care. She'd never see it.

She noticed that he was leading her to the basement. _Odd place for a picture, _Naomi thought. Of course, if the intent was to mock the photographed, then contrasting their beautiful, expensive royal clothes against the disdain and drab of the basement would do quite nicely. He announced when they arrived in the basement, almost as if Naomi didn't know her own home (or, for that matter, that a stinking, dirt floored cavern was a basement). Scythe and their oldest children were already waiting. The younger ones were there shortly. A soldier arranged them in an order appropriate for a photograph and set up a very fancy camera on tripod. Naomi faked a smile as the camera flashed... flashed blue-

* * *

><p>Grey Army Private Garth scooped the ashes that had been the royal family into a wheelbarrow.<p> 


	6. Chapter V Part II

Hope you are all enjoying The Outsider - The Lost Chapters- I'm seeing no feedback and, frankly, it has me worried. At any rate, here is the second part of the fifth chapter of Burning Paper Tigers, hope you enjoy.

* * *

><p>There was fire over Kelly's head. He quickly dove to the ground and rolled to the left behind a tree. There were more reports, the lighter <em>pops<em> of a Tiger MAAR (Manna-Assisted Assault-Rifle). Behind him were the deeper responses of UN ARs, and the occasional boom of an AA-12 automatic shotgun, like the one in Kelly's hands. He sighed, barely poking his head around the tree, searching for the enemies. Tigers had natural camouflage of their own, aside from the dark jungle digital cammo they were clad in. The two combined made them incredibly hard to find. And, out of sight from anything resembling a civilized structure, Kelly couldn't use Fire's Comfort. He sighed, regular magic would have to do, no specialized Unity spells here. Not until he got into Rome. Rome, of course, was one of the many cities absolutely pulverized by UN bombings after the Tiger Army had forced the civilians therein to leave. Thus far, the UN hadn't bombed any cities with civilians still in them. Kelly had to wonder if that would last.

Kelly breathed in, concentrated and absorbed manna from the ground, something only precious few Unities were capable of. That had been the thing that put Kelly into the UN special forces. He regretted that occasionally. Like right now. As soon as Kelly had recovered in the hospital, they'd given him a medal for extreme bravery and valor in combat. They'd then shipped him straight into the Hell that was the thick Tiger jungle. He and his men, along with an armored detachment, were leading a push straight through the heart of Tiger jungle country. He refined the manna and ran it from his optical nerve out, scanning through the jungle for the locations of the Tigers. He found four and a well-concealed maschinengewehr nest. He detailed their locations to his men as the spell ran out. He shook his head, forming a determined grimace and yelling, "First and second squads, forward, third and fourth, covering fire! _Vorwarts! Vorwarts!"_

Some of the men got up and began to move forward in an arched, slow, cautious walk, while others got up behind a tree and laid down a fire base. The maschinengewhr opened up, rattling, sounding as a woodpecker on crack cocaine might sound. The advancing squadrons dropped to the ground. Kelly cursed. "Does anyone have a line of sight on that nest?" he asked over the comm stones.

"Yessir, barely," a private answered tentatively.

"Can you put a manna tag on it?"

"I can try. No promises."

"Do your best son, that's all I ask," Kelly said, crawling forward through the mud of the forest floor. Kelly just knew he'd have the purple itch in his fur before he was done in the jungle. He shrugged and stopped as he got behind a good-sized tree. He didn't dare look around the side of the massive old jungle cherry. Instead of being stupid and doing so, he waited to hear back from the private that was no doubt fervently attempting to place a manna tag on the enemy emplacement.

"I got it sir."

"Good job private. Get in cover," Kelly said, changing his comm. stone channel to 18. "Tactical support command, this is Forward team Sierra Alpha November-1. We are pinned down by an enemy maschinengewhr nest and our panzers are too far to the right to be of assistance. It is manna tagged and we are requesting fire support, over."

The calming voice of a female Unity answered him from somewhere just the other side of the former Tiger-UN border, "Roger that, Seirra Alpha November-1. We have pulled your coordinates from your location units and are redirecting artillery from our nearest fire base, over."

"Tell them to be careful; we're right on top of it, over."

"Don't worry, sir. We don't miss, over."

_You better not, _Kelly thought, but decided not to put it into words. "Roger that. We're waiting, over."

"Artillery inbound. Two shells manna-tracking high-explosive, one shell manna-tracking armor-piercing high-explosive, just to be sure, over and out."

"Roger that, over and out," he said to the operator and, removing his hand from the comm stone, added in a yell to his men, "Get down! We're about the bring the rain!"

His men obeyed, and he even took his own advice. There was a long pause. Just how far away was that artillery? _Far away enough that the Tigers can't hit it back, _Kelly thought. Artillery was valuable, but it was also, emphatically, vulnerable. It didn't move fast. It was easy to find. It was easy to destroy.

At about that moment, Kelly's train of thought was interrupted by the artillery shells crashing through the jungle canopy. There was a series of three explosions that melded into one large explosion. A fountain of, metal, dirt, wood, plants and tiger-striped bodies erupted into the air. A giant jungle hardwood fell over where one of the shells had struck it. Light flooded through the new gap in the canopy and onto the jungle floor. "Charge!" Kelly yelled, wanted to take advantage of the artillery's shock on the enemy troops.

His men jumped up from behind decaying logs and rolled out from behind massive jungle trees, firing. Kelly got up and ran, bringing the big gun up to his shoulder and lining the sights up in front of his eyes. He was poised to kill. That done, he charged forward, jumping over logs in his way and waving the barrel back and forth, constantly scanning for targets. A Tiger appeared behind a tree. Kelly squeezed the trigger, being careful not to snap it and throw his aim off. The massive gun seemed to shake the ground below him, but it barely kicked. _Fine action they put on this piece, _Kelly thought, admiring the automatic weapon. It was the best small arm Lane Industries made, Kelly thought, which was saying something. Though some foreign companies made very fine arms in small quantities, LI made _the_ best mass-produced arms in the world.

A mortar shell not too far from him reminded Kelly to focus on the present. He jumped behind a tree that'd been felled as some form of defensive position. Kelly put a hand on the comm stone. "Hold here. It seems the Tigers are retreating. They must have something nasty planned." His squad mates settled down into defensible positions. "Let's wait for the armor to catch up." Armor was slow in the jungle, but it was a whole lot stronger than Kelly and his men were. "In the meantime, group up."

He and his men found each other and formed into a more concerted defensive line. They stayed on the alert, but took a well-deserved and much-needed break nonetheless. Dean opened the visor on his helmet and smoked. Kelly took his helmet off and rubbed his ears, which were somewhat chaffed from the edges of his helmet. He sighed. The amount of Fox blood in him made his ears bigger than the average Unity's. That was a real pain when Kelly had to wear helmets with ear-cuts. He sighed, shrugged, and put the helmet back on. He heard the rumbled of the armor as it crashed through the forest. "Alright, men, forward! Slowly now!"

Several of the men put their helmets back on. Several only had to close their visors. They all grabbed their respective weapons and begun a slow advance through the thinning forest. They were nearing the forest edge. Good. That was what they were really after, anyway. Suddenly, the forest ceased to be. The Unities huddled behind spots of cover in the forest. The city was visible, only a few kilometers away. Kelly changed his visor's display to manna-vision (similar to infrared-vision, but much more useful), which illuminated not only bodies, but also where bodies had been and also where spells had been used. Kelly didn't see any traps, but the Tigers were starting to get good at hiding their spells. He set the visor to augment his normal vision with objectives, tactical information and a manna-vision overlay. Kelly loved Unity technology.

The armor now sat just behind the forest edge, with Kelly's infantry. He hopped up on the glacis plate of the lead panzer, and onto the turret, where the panzer commander was sitting, his head out of the copula. "It looks clear, but the Tigers have something waiting for us. There's no cover, so we'll advance behind you."

"Yeah, sounds good. How far is it to the city limits?" the panzer commander, a burly Unity named Gunther Grilparzer-Legacy, a burly Unity of about twenty - a little old for his rank - answered.

"Just eyeballing it, a couple of kilometers. My visor says sixteen, but only the gods know where command set the objective point at."

"Yeah, ours are reading about twenty."

"It's not good when armor and special forces commands aren't coordinating properly," Kelly said disheartedly.

The panzer man shook his head, "No, not at all."

There was a beep on Kelly's command stone. Kelly touched it. The same female Unity spoke, "Sierra Alpha-November 1, be advised, there is a squadron of USAF F-35s near your position. If you need fire support, they are prepared to provide. Be advised that they do not have systems capable of tracking a manna tag. Laser and smoke designators only. You can be in contact with them on channel 18."

"Roger that, thanks for the info," Kelly said to the operator and turned to Gunther, "USAF F-35s will be providing fire support for us. Channel 18, laser and smoke designators only."

"Good to know."

Kelly nodded, "Yeah, and the operator seemed to be glad to be rid of us." Kelly had been

relying on fire support a lot to keep moving through the dense jungle.

The panzerman laughed, "Its like they're too good for us."

"Yeah, I'd love to see that priss-tail fight through this Hell."

"Wouldn't that be a show?"

"Yeah, a show we'll never have the privilege of seeing."

"Pity." Gunther seemed truly disappointed.

"Indeed," Kelly tuned his comm. stone to channel 18. "USAF-35s? This is Sierra Alpha-November 1, over."

A slightly familiar female voice with an odd accent answered, "Roger that, Sierra Alpha-November 1. We're here, over."

"I understand you're ready to provide fire support, over?"

"Correct, you mark it, we'll make sure it ceases to exist, over," the flier answered.

"Understood. We'll be moving toward the city thorough an open field. Be ready to provide cover, over and out."

"Roger that, we'll get into position, over and out."

Kelly set his unit comm. stone to communicate with his men, the panzers and the fliers, patted the top of the panzer, "Alright, time for these brutes to get moving. We'll fall in behind you. The fliers should be providing cover."

"Alright," Grilparzer said, ducking down into the cabin of the panzer, "Let's move!"

Kelly jumped off. "Alright, men, behind the panzers!" he called, motioning them forward. The machines crashed out into the open field and his men took off at full sprint. Lane doctrine (and common sense) dictated that staying out of the open in combat was a good idea. When you have to go in the open, get out.

Two F-35s swooped dangerously low, then suddenly became stationary with the Unity forces. The fighters were clearly hovering, only moving at the pace of the ground forces, well below the stall speed of most aircraft. _Impressive design._ A MCT-RPG round flew out from somewhere beyond the clearing, aiming at the mostly stationary aircraft. The fighter to Kelly's left, the one clearly targeted, rolled out of the way, just in time. _Nimble, too._ A stream of tracers erupting from the fighter followed the rocket. They impacted somewhere obscured by the panzer in front of Kelly. Kelly hoped that whatever was obscured was now dead; thoroughly so. Another RPG answered with a firm tone of _Nope. _There was another stream of red-hot tracers, this time from the fighter to Kelly's right.

A maschinenengewhere on a panzer to the right opened up. It's big gun boomed. _Enemy armor? That's not good. _Open country was ideal for panzers. It sucked for infantry.

Kelly touched his comm. stone, "What are we dealin' with here? I'm blind."

The female flier answered, "Infantry armed with small arms and RPGs. Dug in."

Kelly let out a sigh of relief. Dug in infantry was hard to deal with, but that wasn't anything close to dealing with armor. "Alright, men," Kelly called, "We've got heavily armed and dug in infantry ahead. Be ready."

There was a series of 'rogers' and 'yessirs.' The panzers stopped just short of a trench system. Kelly and his men rounded the big machines and jumped into the trenches. Kelly was greeted by a small Tiger round straight in his bulletproof vest. Kelly returned the greeting in the form of a 12-gauge manna-enhanced slug. It took the Tiger down. He advanced slowly forward. A bolt of manna seared into his chest. _Not again. _It hadn't gone through his armor, though, thankfully. After dispatching two or three more Tigers, Kelly jumped behind a large crate and begun a spell to reinforce the gap in his armor. It worked, thankfully, though Kelly doubted it'd hold up long, especially not in this hellhole inside a hellhole. He glanced around the crate. No Tiger appeared to be waiting on him. There was, however, a sharp bend around which a crouching Tiger was surely hiding. "Grenade!"Kelly called and chucked a Manna Burst Fragmentation Grenade. It went neatly around the corner. There was a sound that was hard to describe; like a whining camera flash, a sucking noise. He waved the rest of his men forward, rounding after them. They cleared the corner with no trouble. There were two deep booms from Unity AA-12s, the somewhat lighter barks of Unity assault rifles, several light pops from Tiger assault rifles. The Tiger guns fell silent. Kelly and his men kept moving.

They reached the end of the trenches, which, at the moment was a pillbox collapsed by Unity panzer fire. Kelly tapped the unit comm. stone. "Second squad, you cleared the tunnels yet?"

"Just cleaning up, sir," his first lieutenant answered.

"Alright, let's get of this hellhole."

"Panzers, can you get over these trenches?"

"Yessir, we can jump these no problem."

"Then let's all get out of this hellhole!"

* * *

><p>Amber's F-35 hovered just over a formation of Unity tanks and infantry, who were charging towards Rome, a Tiger city destroyed by Unity shelling. She was close to bingo fuel, cannon rounds were at about half, and she'd already expended two of her radar missiles on enemy fighters. She was going to assist the special forces team until they got into the city. By then, she'd be about useless.<p>

"Captain!" Her wingman called. "Surface installations; I can't tell if they're SAMs or anti-tank missiles."

"I see 'em. Laser designators locked on. Firing two LGs."

The missiles left their bays and bored into their targets.

"There's something in this city they don't want us seeing, over," Kelly, the leader of the Unity team, said flatly.

"Agreed," Amber replied. "They didn't put up this big of a fight over their capital. There's something here. Also, captain, I see a line of defensive fortifications in sight, but they don't appear to be manned. Do you wish for me to take them out, over?"

"How long can you stay here, over?"

"We've got about five minutes, over."

"Take 'em out. Better safe than sorry, over."

"Roger that, over." Even as she spoke, she was arming her last two LGs and cannon.

Her wingman, who could see her actions on his screen, advised, "You've only got two missiles left. Use your cannon. I'll handle the explosives, over."

"Wilco, over."

Her wingman's missiles took out guard-tower looking structures. Her cannon took out pillboxes and machine gun nests.

"That should do it, Cap. We're out of here, over."

"Roger that, thanks for the help, ma'am, over and out."

"My pleasure, over and out." she said, converting her fighter back to flight mode. She joined her other two squad-mates, who'd been flying high guard well above their position. They all started towards USAF high command near Lyn'Knol. She switched from comm. stone to her radio, "Sorry, boys, I gotta head to USA command. I'll see you shortly, over."

"Roger that, Captain. You need a wingman, over?"

"Naw. We're well in UN airspace, over and out."

"Roger. See you at base, over and out."

Amber rolled her fighter fifteen degrees southwest, toward the USA's tactical headquarters, right on the UN and HR border.

Her comm. stone beeped for attention. She touched the control panel. It was Joe. "Change of plans. The meeting's been postponed; Bastian has to be present to command a beach assault."

"I'm still going to need to land, Joe, I'm almost out of fuel."

"You're about to pass over Nash. There's an airport there and you have military clearance to land there whenever you want. I'll meet you there and make sure they have fossil fuel."

"Got it, I'll be there. Thanks."

* * *

><p>Kelly was holding onto a handrail on the back of the lead Unity panzer. "How's it lookin' up there, Gunther?"<p>

"The Flyboys and girls did a number on those defenses. I daresay it'll be smooth sailing."

"That's what I like to hear, keep rolling!" The panzers ran as fast as the infantry could keep up. Kelly's men took turns riding on the back handholds for rest. Running 15 kph for such a long distance was no small feat. Kelly found himself drawing in and expending manna just to keep his strength reserves up.

Kelly climbed up on the panzer in front of him both for a rest and so he could see ahead. They were nearing a wall that encircled the city. Missile batteries laid in wreckage, as did structures that were once watch towers of some form. The towers had once housed maschinengewehre, Kelly realized as they grew nearer. _But they faced _inward, _not outward. "Was zum Teufel?"_ he muttered out loud. "Gunther, is it just me, or do those maschinengewehre face in, toward the city?"

The panzerman took his time to respond. "Yessir, those things were designed to keep something in, not us out."

"Halt when you get to the wall."

"Roger."

The panzers lurched to a stop as they neared the fortifications, whatever they were.

* * *

><p>Joe slid out her chair for her and let Amber sit down inside the fancy Unity restaurant. He sat opposite her.<p>

"Your plane should be fueled in a few hours," he said, "They didn't have any jet fuel here, they'll have to ship it in."

"Okay," Amber replied, "I'm not in any hurry; I'm off duty for the moment."

Joe nodded. The waiter walked up. They ordered. Joe got Filet Mignon, which, for some reason, had the same name on Mekkan as on Earth. Amber had some form of marinated steak and chicken that Joe said was a local dish.

While they waited for their food, Amber asked a question she'd needed to for some time, but hadn't had opportunity to. With both of them tied up in a war, they hadn't had much time to socialize. "Joe, when I was fighting with a dragon, he said something about a war between the Cats and Tigers, and that General Lane died in it. I know you were going to tell me about the Cats, too, so now would be good."

Joe sighed, "I was scared I'd have to explain."

Amber rose a curious eyebrow. Joe would have added an attentive ear to that.

"You've read _The Outsider, _right? It'll make a whole lot more sense if you have."

Amber nodded.

"Good, you've already got the background knowledge you need. Now, then, it's year 498. Curt's been running Lane Industries for about two years and he's hard at work forming the United Keidran, an alliance of all the Keidran clans, to unite them, instead of their loose affiliations. The Tigers refuse to sign it. They've somehow avoided a war with the Humans, and they don't want to start one, either. The Cats sign it regardless. It creates some friction between the Cats and the Tigers. In 501, the Tigers and the Humans form a tense alliance, if you can believe that. A day later, the Tigers start attacking the Cats."

* * *

><p>Kelly jumped off the back of the panzer and examined the fortifications. He set a hand on an intact section of the wall. Finally, civilization. Fired bricks.<p>

"_Solemn comfort of fire be,_

_The Power, oh, darkness to see,_

_Into the depths of night peer_

_So seen is evil's mighty sneer"_

He felt the spell's power surge through him, but that wasn't what he wanted. His vision sharpened. His senses heightened. He examined the wall. It was prewar. Way prewar. While the shell was built sometime in the last year, probably to protect against USA forces, the wall itself was probably built turn of the fourteenth century. The towers had been added in the 1800's. In-facing cannon openings had been covered up at the turn of the twentieth century, _Right on par with the re-discovery of the maschinengewehr, _Kelly deeper into it revealed remnants of a wall even older. First century. A cornerstone, the only thing that had been left intact from what Kelly thought to be the original wall, read _"__Maly Trastsianiet__, 506."_

He ended Fire's Comfort. "Gunther!"

"Sir?"

"Something's up. This wall dates back to 506, and they've been keeping it up to date. All the fortifications - except the most recent - are in-facing. They were designed to keep something in, not anything out."

"Sir, I don't know, but be cautious."

* * *

><p>Joe continued, "The UK and the Bastians throw everything they can spare in to help the Cats. Trace Legacy, trapped in Lyn'Knoll, which was unreachable at the time, just so you know, lead the Cat forces from hiding, using dragons to deliver his orders with only a few hours' delay. Man was almost as much of a military genius as Curt. Curt had him only by experience, I daresay. At any rate, the Cats had lost by about 506. The Tigers annexed their land and begun a genocide campaign. They started by isolating the Cats while their own colonists came in and took the land. Then they moved the Cats somewhere deep inside their jungles to prevent UK rescue missions, which happened somewhat frequently. No one ever heard from the Cats after they were moved. It's assumed that they were killed, mass genocide."<p>

* * *

><p>Kelly nodded, "Yeah, you boys head on in first. We'll stay behind, in cover. This place looks like heaven for snipers."<p>

"Roger," Gunther said, closing the cupola over his head, not wanting to fall prey to a sniper himself. The panzers once again lurched forward, belching acrid diesel smoke. They moved through holes in the wall created by the USAF fighters. Kelly, with a glace at the gaping hole in his chest armor, reactivated Fire's Comfort and moved forward after the mechanical beasts.

With his enhanced and far-reaching vision, he searched for snipers in the remnants of the tall buildings around him. He found several before they found his men. Several found him first. A bloody sniper-countersniper battle ensued. Kelly lost five men. However, once they moved beyond the outer limits of the city, they found that there were no enemy forces. None at all. _All that's left here are the guards for whatever this place used to be._

He ended Fire's Comfort again, but kept himself on high alert. "Squadron, fan out, I want to know why this place was quarantined!"

Kelly searched the remains of what looked like a factory. As he clambered into the ruins, he realized that it was instead a slaughterhouse. Slaughterhouse-5 to be precise. He searched around. The stench of rotten meat hung heavy in the air. The place had only recently been shut down. It seemed to have fared pretty well against the Unity bombings.

Suddenly, he noticed a row of doors that didn't look particularly interesting. What caught Kelly's eyes was the fact that they had automated (but now inactive) sentry guns guarding them. He walked up to the one closest to him and tried to open it. It was locked. He started to rear back and kick it in, but realized that it was locked from _his _side of it. Odd. He shrugged and unlocked it with a turn of the deadbolt. He got into a fair door breaching position, hoping he wasn't about to bite off more than he could chew. He threw the door open. Darkness greeted him. The electricity being down, that was nothing out of the ordinary. He switched on his gun's light. Inset, green eyes glowed back at him. Skeletons with furred skin stretched over them like an artist's canvas and tattered ears were faintly visible as he moved his light back and forth. _"Die götter uns alle retten..."_

"Sir... I... I... f- found s-s-some-something..." Gunther reported hollowly. Shockedly.

"Yeah, Grilparzer, I found it, too."

"Oh, gods, save us all..."

* * *

><p>Amber was in shock. It took her a few seconds to recover and form a coherent answer. "You're kidding."<p>

"Wish I was. That's why you'll never see a pure Cat. There were some Human slaves, and, yes, those that escaped the Tiger Ghettos, but their bloodlines were destroyed because there weren't enough pure Cats around."

Amber nodded, "Then how was Curt killed?"

"He took a dragon and was headed to take command of the Cat forces. No one ever heard from him after that."

"Anyone know what happened to him?"

"History books will tell you that he was shot down somewhere mid-flight. I wouldn't trust the history bo-"

Both their comm. stones beeped, cutting Joe off. They both picked them up. "Generals?" a very shocked sounding voice (which Amber recognized as the special forces sergeant's) inquired.

"Yes?"

"Sir... I... I... don't know how to explain it... We... We found the Cats..."

"The Cats? That's impossible."

"I thought walking skeletons were, too. Most of them speak Keidran. The Tigers used them for slave labor and... for lab rats. Test animals. Kept them half alive, barely fed."

Amber felt blood drain from her face, "1945 all over again."


	7. Chapter VI

Alright, fellas, I know it's short and I know it's been a while. Between college and work, I barley have time to write these days. But believe me, I've not forgotten Mekkan. I've also ran into serious writer's block on The Outsider Lost Chapters, so I'm going to put it on hold for a while. Maybe I can finish Burning Paper Tigers before then."  
>At any rate, now that exams are over, I should be able to write some more.<br>And here's the sixth chapter of Burning Paper Tigers. 

* * *

><p>The images of the skeletons haunted Kelly day and night. It was terrifying, seeing these people who, for all intents and purposes should have been dead, walking around. Trying to feed them. Trying to make them back into who they should have been. He remembered his first conversation with one.<p>

"What's your name?"

"Name?" he said, mispronouncing the simple Keidran. "I don't know what you're talking about. They don't let us speak much."

"What are you called?"

"Usually, nothing that I'd care to repeat. My formal designation is prisoner 81-034-217."

"By the gods," Kelly said, absolutely taken aback, "You don't have a name."

"I guess not."

But that wasn't even the worst part. It wasn't even close. He'd had about a week in the camp before another officer had replaced him and he'd been moved back to front line duty. Now that USA forces had discovered the camps, the Tigers, to Hell with all of them!, had begun ordering the Cats to fight as soldiers. They'd armed them, yes, but poorly. Very poorly.

But it wasn't their armament or their performance on the battlefield that haunted him. It was the image of a thousand skeletons charging him. Worse, he had to kill those innocent, tortured souls. He supposed it was really some kind of mercy. He told himself that, anyhow. It'd been happening for weeks now. At one point or another, almost all of his men had been forced to go back to base for counseling. Kelly was among them. It was haunting. If one couldn't stop fighting at night, how was he expected to keep fighting in the day?

So, Kelly sat in the med tent, waiting for his prescription of anti-anxiety medication. Bloody hell, he needed it.

But the doctor wasn't the one to come through the door. It was General Lane. Kelly snapped to attention. Saluted.

"As you were."

He went to a tense parade rest. Was he about to be criticized for needing this medication? If so, the General could go straight to Hell. It was only a few miles to the east, after all.

But no, that wasn't it at all, "How you holding out, son?"

"Not well, as demonstrated by my presence here."

The General nodded, "I understand. I can't get the nightmares to go away either, and I haven't fought them. You have, may the gods bless your soul."

Kelly nodded.

"Look son, I'm here to get you away from here. You have a unique set of skills that we need. You're going to become part of a very elite unit. Your job will be to take out the Tiger King, collapse their chain of command, win this thing short and simple. Our men's heads can't hold out much longer against this. You know that as well as I do."

Kelly nodded. "By the gods, is that true."

The General motioned to the tent exit. "C'mon son, let's get out of this Hellhole."

* * *

><p>Joe paced around the barren room nervously.<p>

"Joe, sit down," Amber said.

"I'm sorry, I can't. I'm far too restless. I'm nervous. Worried."

"Worrying is my job, you know that," she teased. It was a joke they'd developed from Amber's tendency to worry far too much.

"True. But, still."

"Well, first off, sit down," she said, patting on the seat beside her.

He obeyed, though he was rather reluctant about it.

"What are you worried about?"

"Quite a lot. There's a problem with just about everything we're doing. Many of our men are on the verge of going insane. Some are already there. And then there's the operation we plan to take out the Tiger chain of command. It's insanely risky. We've never done anything like it. And if it fails..."

"It won't fail," she interrupted gently.

"There's such a strong chance, though. It's so new. We've never done it before."

She sat a reassuring hand on his back, rubbed it gently. She knew he liked that, and more than a human did. "Don't worry about it. What do you always tell me? That worrying doesn't do any good? Besides, you got the best of the best, right? They'll pull it off."

"That's part of what worries me; the best of the best don't all come from Unity Nation. I'm worried that nationality and species difference might make the team not function as it should."

"If your world is as advanced, as... as equal, as I think it is, you'll have no trouble whatsoever."

"Here's hoping," he said, checking his comm. stone. Amber could see that a text message alerted him that the team members had arrived. He got up. Sighed.

Amber grabbed his chin, made him look at her as she stood up. "It'll be alright," she said, and after a bit of thought, gave him a light kiss on the cheek.

He looked at her, stunned.

"Well, go on, now, don't keep them waiting."

"Yeah, wouldn't want to do that, now would I?" He asked in a daze.

Amber giggled, "Well, go on."

He walked out, with his senses seeming to be back to normal. Amber grinned deviously and followed him loosely.

When she walked into the room, the team was already assembled and at attention. Joe paced in front of them. "Well, gentlemen, and lady, you've just become four of the most important people on Mekkan. I've already told you what you're doing, but I've brought in an ally to explain how you're doing it. First off, however, I believe some introductions are in order. You have all been allowed to choose a codename. You will not reveal your real name, not even to your comrades, while working in this unit, especially if captured. This is for the sake of your families.

"Your team leader is our Unity, Grey. He is an officer in the UNAF (none of you will be revealing your ranks). He's a tactical genius and he's pretty handy with both magic and weapons. Your weapons specialist is aptly named Scar, your Bastian component." The Bastian raised a hand to indicate himself. He had a ghastly knife wound across his forehead that ran, narrowly missing his eye, down his face and below his right ear. "The man could bring down the Great Tiger Wall with half an ounce of C4." The Bastian grinned. "Your magical expert also named herself aptly. Meet Foxy." Amber almost took offense before she realized that the magical expert was indeed a Fox. She subdued a giggle at herself and let Joe proceed. "She can make the strongest of men do her bidding by the thousands, not that I don't suspect her of that minus the magic." That time, Amber was offended. Joe waved a couple of fingers subtly towards Amber for her to ignore the remarks. They'd talk about that later. "Your technological expert is your Human component, Eagleye. He can hack through any firewall on Mekkan in a matter of seconds, not that I advise him to try it on ours." Joe did seem to know what he was doing. The team members laughed after each introduction. "Now then, my personal favorite introduction, the ally I spoke of earlier. Meet Amber Finney, Captain, USAF. She's going to be instructing you on your insertion."

Amber, pretending to not be flattered by the first part of his introduction, stepped forward. "It was a concept we came up with back on Earth, but we couldn't perform it because our technology is too limited. Magic, however, seems to have few boundaries." She paused as lights dimmed and a magically generated holographic projection appeared from the floor in front of her. Obviously, it was stuff they didn't have back on Earth. "We termed it 'Figher-Based Rapid Infantry Deployment,' F-B-R-I-D, or f-bird as we like to call it. The idea is that you'll need to be inserted in an area of high enemy air activity and defenses. A HALO jump would be too risky as the Tigers still have a high concentration of SAM sites in the area. However, a stealth fighter can penetrate these defenses. We've made one or two bombing runs with UNAF-adapted F-35s and they have been able to drop bombs on the compound we believe the Tiger King to be hiding out in." The holographic projector had been following along with her speech the whole time, displaying high concentrations of enemies, a HALO jump, the local SAM sites and finally the compound they believed the King to be hiding in. She pressed a button on a manna stone remote. A life-sized image of a FBRID capsule appeared.

"This is a f-bird capsule. If you're thinking that it looks like a bomb, you're right. However, this is a bomb that you can climb into."

"I'm the smallest one here, and I'm pretty sure that I wouldn't fit into that," Foxy said.

"That's where the magic comes in," Amber said. "The magic serves two functions. The first is to allow you to fit in the capsule. The second is that it protects you on impact."

"Wait... Impact?" Grey, who Amber recognized as Kelly from their first appearance on Mekkan, asked.

Amber simply pressed a button on the manna stone and pointed to the holographic display. The FBRID capsule tilted and shrunk, fitting nicely into the holographic bay of a holographic UNAF F-35. It went flying over holographic terrain. The bomb bay on the fighter opened and the capsule dropped. It buried itself into the ground, creating a nice crater, from which a poorly simulated soldier emerged.

"Need I say more?"

A shaking of heads and general astonishment among the team members told her that she needn't.

Joe took back over, letting the men sit in their chairs as he began going over the hairyer details of the plan. She realized that he'd made them stay at attention, give her respect, for the entire duration of her speech. She grinned to herself, but quickly suppressed it. While neither of them had said anything about it, Amber was pretty sure that neither of them wanted their men to know about the relationship she and Joe were developing. Technically, there was no regulation against it, but it was a large technicality. They weren't violating regulation only because there hadn't been enough time for a regulation to be formed. Nonetheless, they both liked the idea of keeping everything on the down low.

The briefing took quite some time. Joe was his usual methodical self, covering every possible detail and everything that could go wrong. "I'm guessing that, having bored you with every detail I can think of, there'll be no questions."

The four members shook their heads.

"Dismissed."

They exited.

"Now, for you, miss," he said, turning to her. "What was that little kiss for?"

"What do you think?" she asked grinning widely, walked up, and gave him one smack on the lips. It was quick, but she was surprised by how warm his lips were.

As opposed to giving him time to react, she left the room.

* * *

><p>The FBRID HUD told Kelly... or, Grey, that they were moving at well over 1900 KPH. That was what, Mach 1.1? 1.2? Whatever it was, they were coming into Tiger territory hot. They were only at a few hundred meters high, too. They had to go low enough to avoid enemy radar. Fast enough that sighting reports couldn't be acted upon before the fighters were over the compound.<p>

One other bombing run had been conducted on the compound, using the same parameters as this one. It had been successful. Kelly only hoped that it would work twice.

The flight leader came over the comm channel, "One minute to destination."

Unlike a normal jump, Kelly really didn't have to do much to prepare for this drop. The capsule was pre-prepared for the drop, the spells already in place, trajectory locked in.

"Bay doors open. 3, 2, 1, drop."

Kelly heard the latches release the capsule. There were eight distinct clinking sounds. Four were Kelly's pod. Four were Foxy's. There was a brief period where he felt like he was hanging in the air. Then the pod dropped suddenly. His feet were suddenly pointing down, rather than level with the rest of his body. The pod's displays shut down, directing their power to the capsule shielding. He was suddenly aware that he was moving very fast. Then, impact. The whole world seemed to suddenly stop, shake. The capsule lid ejected, flying off and revealing the crater around him. The pod was stuck at an almost horizontal angle in the wall of the crater, meaning that it would be some kind of climb getting out. Kelly struggled for some time before he heard voices in Keidran. "Sir! Duds!"

His suit HUD told him the others had already got out of their capsules and clear of the site. Crap. Plan B it was. Kelly rolled and hid himself under the capsule. He pressed a spot below his wrist, bent his wrist down. A four inch long spike shot out. Behind it were two crystals stuck into slots on his armor. One glowed a healthy manna blue. The other glowed black, if that was even possible. He remembered Foxy's instructions. _"There are two crystals, two spells. Both wrap around the spike. The first spell is a Black Magic spell. Instant kill. Miliseconds. The second is a more... typical spell. It will make you look and sound exactly like whoever you stab with the spike. Press each crystal in to use them both, or either one to use just that spell."_

Kelly pressed both crystals into their slots. They liquefied, filling the tiny grooves of the spell, which wound up around the spike, twisting around and intersecting each other, crossing at the tip and winding back down in an intricate spiral. Both glowed their respective colors. A foot appeared at the rim of the crater. Took two steps deeper into the crater. Kelly threw a punch, magical spike leading the way. It cracked through hardened armor and into soft flesh. The form collapsed. Kelly drug him below the rim. He retracted the spike with the flick of his wrist and looked at himself to check that he looked just like the Tiger. He did, so he stood up.

"What the hell, private?" one of the Tigers, an officer, asked harshly.

"Ground's real loose. Slid on me."

"Whatever. What'd you find?"

"These aren't Unity. They're from the Great Lane's world." Kelly had to be careful not to call it Earth. The Tigers didn't know what Earth was yet, and mentioning it might be a dead giveaway.

"How do you know?"

"Too big. Unities have nothing that big." He again descended into the crater, hid the body a little better. Fastened the top of the capsule securely.

"If they're from such an advanced world, why didn't they go off?"

"Timed?"

"Aw, hell. Everybody, clear!"

Suddenly, the officer dropped, without so much as a sound. The other two Tigers who'd been sent to investigate were right behind him. A Bastian, a Fox and a Human appeared, stabbed the bodies with spikes on their wrist, turned into perfect copies of them.

Kelly touched his comm stone. "Hide the bodies in your capsule, be sure to grab their ID cards," he said as he did just that. He fastened the lid shut once the Tiger was hid.

"C'mon, we need to go and report in... or something like that."

They walked back to the compound's smaller entrance, scanned their cards and entered. Another officer - Kelly wasn't that proficient at reading Tiger ranks - was waiting. Impatiently, it seemed. "Well?"

"There's four craters with four rather large bombs still in them. We think they're timed," Eagleye, who was disguised as the Tiger Captain, stated.

"We'll just keep the frontcourt clear and wait for them to go off, then. You're dismissed."

They all nodded their thanks, stood to attention, formed the Tiger salute, a hand vertically against the chest and then straight out at a 45 degree angle. They smartly made a turn on their heels and marched out.

"To the King?" Scar asked quietly.

"To the King," Kelly confirmed equally quietly. "First we just have to find him," He said after some pause.

"Grey?"

Kelly almost didn't recognize his codename, but he caught it after a few seconds. He turned to face Foxy. "Hello? Magic expert here."

"Work your magic, then," he said, "No pun intended."

A manna crystal somewhere on Foxy's belt dissolved. Her eyes glowed blue.

"Found him."

"Lead the way."

So she did.

They rounded several corners. Finally they came to a hallway where two guards stood by a doorway labeled in Keidran. Kelly was a bit rusty at reading Keidran, but even if he couldn't have read any Keidran, he could've told exactly what the sign above their heads read, "RESTRICTED AREA. CLEARANCE LEVEL TWO REQUIRED."

Kelly looked at the ID card he'd swiped off of the Tiger he was pretending to be. "Crap. Any luck, anybody?"

"Nope."

"Nada."

"One and a half, whatever that's good for."

"Not this, apparently."

"Magic?"

"Yeah, I can do it," Foxy said as she made a move for the guards. Was it just Kelly, or was she putting a bit of extra swing in her hips? She definitely was. _So that's the approach she's taking._

Her voice was very persuasive... or, more accurately, seductive, as she convinced the guards to let her and her 'fellas' through.

Kelly wasn't surprised when it worked.

As the door clanked closed behind them, Kelly asked, "Did you even have to use magic?"

"Not for me. A bit for you 'fellas.'" she laughed.

Kelly and Scar exchanged glances and shrugged. They were presently walking along a long hallway that had defensive positions clearly made into it. _Glad we didn't try doing this the hard way, _Kelly thought. The hallway was probably ten meters long and ended in a t-junction. "Left," Foxy said. This hallway, about the same length, ended in a mounted maschinengewehr nest that was, fortunately, unmanned. However, beside the nest was a checkpoint that was manned. This one required clearance three. "Changing our cards might work better this time," Kelly said as he used a simple spell to do that to his, putting level five clearance markers on it just for good measure. Foxy performed the trick for the other members.

They were halted about two meters before the checkpoint. The guard spoke in simple Keidran with a Tiger Capitol accent, "Halt. Cards." They presented them.

The guard took two giant steps to them and took their cards. He examined them with his eyes and then ran a glowing hand over them. "All's clear," he said to the empty emplacement. Suddenly, the nest wasn't so empty anymore. The Tiger that had appeared nodded and lowered the gun.

"Security's tight these days, isn't it?" Eagleye asked with a subtle gesture to the nest.

The guard shrugged. "The Unity lines being less than a hundred kilometers from here doesn't help, buddy. Move along."

They obeyed. The heavy door was opened for them and closed tightly right behind them. Security _was _tight these days. "How many more of these checkpoints we got to go through, Foxy?"

"Two. The first is for level four. Unfortunately, the second checkpoint requires an audience or business with the King."

"Then I guess we'll make do there."

"By 'make do' I assume you mean blow everything sky high?" Scar asked.

"Why, of course," Kelly said with a devious grin. Who didn't like blowing things up, after all?

There were many more sets of hallways and passages. They came up to the level four checkpoint.

There were two nest containing weapons that looked far more menacing than the one at the last checkpoint. A group of three burly Tigers stopped them well in advance.

"Cards?" The leader, a female Tiger with a harsh Northern Kingdom accent asked.

They handed them over. She inspected them by eye, comparing the photographs with the actuals. Ran a glowing hand over them. "Everything checks out, but I've never seen level five clearance before. The next checkpoint requires business with the King, not additional clearance."

"It's for the King's Kitchens," Kelly said cooly.

"I've never seen them before."

"New policy."

"Figures. They are making security so tight around here it's almost crazy."

Kelly shrugged, "No joke. Now try going through all of the checkpoints. It's not an easy task, I assure you."

"I can imagine," she said, handing them their cards back and waving them on. They passed through the heavy steel and concrete door, which was opened and closed for them.

"That was close," Scar muttered, relieved.

"No kidding. Good save, Grey," Foxy said with a thankful nod.

"That's my job," Kelly said, tipping a hat that wasn't there.

Foxy rolled her eyes and guided them through several mazes worth of passageways. She stopped them at a point. "Grey," she said, "You've got a choice to make."

"Fire away," Kelly said.

"Well, the command and control center is this way," she said, pointing. That was the objective. Eliminate the King, take out the chain of command. End it all with a precise, surgical strike. "But the King isn't there. He's in his own room, and it's pretty heavily guarded."

"Are the rest of the Generals in the command center?"

"Yes."

"I'll take the King. You three handle the commanders."

"You need backup for that. You can't go alone," Scar said firmly.

"How old is that section?" Kelly enquired of Foxy.

"One of the oldest. Couple hundred years old, at least."

That was before concrete. That meant fired bricks. "I'll be just fine, then," Kelly said.

"You... You little..." Kelly noted some kind of restraint on Foxy's part. "You know Fire's Comfort, don't you?"

Kelly grinned, nodded curtly, "Guilty as charged."

Foxy shook her head still, "You'll still need backup. I don't think you understand what I mean by _heavily _guarded."

"Very well, you and Eagleye handle the Command center. We need our tech officer in there."

Eagleye nodded, "Good choice."

"Scar, you're with me."

"All of the King's Guards are magic experts. Let me come with you," Foxy said.

"Then we'll have two magic experts on one team and none on the other."

"I'm not magically inept," Eagleye said. "Except for what the Bastians use, there's no such thing as magic free tech. I'm pretty good at magic."

"Very well," Kelly nodded, waving the Human and Bastian on.

He and Foxy started running towards the King's chambers. "We're only going to have one shot at this," she said.

Kelly watched the walls of the compound grow increasingly older as they ran deeper and deeper into the heart of the compound. "I know. We can do this." The walls turned to fired brick. Kelly let his hand trace it, drawing the ancient manna out.

"_Solemn comfort of fire be,_

_The Power, oh, darkness to see,_

_Into the depths of night peer_

_So seen is evil's mighty sneer"_

"I envy you sometimes," Foxy said as the golden refined manna rolled off Kelly's arms. He'd almost forgotten that only Unities and Humans could use Fire's Comfort.

There was the guardpost.

"Halt! Stop where you are now!" the guards shouted.

They both shut off the spells that masked their identities. Kelly squeezed the manna in his right hand until it ignited. He flung the fireball at the maschinengewehr nest. Being fired manna, it behaved much like napalm, spreading out and burning all it could get its fiery fingers on. Bullets were flying towards them.

"Shield!" Foxy shouted as she formed one automatically.

"_Ignis scutum," _Kelly said, forming a flaming shield in front of him. The bullets struck it, flattened, melted. A simple motion of his hands, a quick straightening of the fingers, sent the shield flying towards the Tigers. More golden manna was formed into a ball in his hands, compressed it to just below the point of ignition. He formed a hard shell of regular manna around it and flung it at the heavy concrete and steel door that blocked the entrance.

Upon contact, the blue manna shell was immediately dissolved by spells on the door, as Kelly had expected. The golden manna, however exploded. There wasn't much of the door left. Alarms now sounded. Kelly shrugged. They were bound to start soon enough anyhow.

Surprisingly, there weren't any more guards waiting behind the door. Nonetheless, they ran forward through the door, keeping a wary eye (Kelly's wary eyes enhanced by Fire's Comfort) out. His vision highlighted the dark forms that rounded a corner, guns drawn. A whip of golden manna stopped the bullets, another stripped the enemies of their weapons.

Kelly threw a punch into the air, tossing golden manna with it.

A blue shield arose from the enemy lines to block it. Kelly kept charging.

"_Fire's Comfort, soothing warmth now bring,_

_The darkness alight with your blaze of bright."_

It was a simple addition to Fire's Comfort, known as Comfort's Light. Essentially, it was a flash-bang grenade of ancient origins. Foxy's helmet visor would shield her. The Tigers weren't so lucky.

It also made the golden manna burn white hot. More bursts of manna were thrown. The manna coated Tigers, alighting them. Other Tigers blocked. Foxy threw bursts of glowing blue manna that exploded or killed on contact.

Kelly was at the enemy formation now. He jumped over their front row.

Blue manna bolts flew at him while he was in air. Sweeping motions of the hand blocked them.

He brought manna into his hands, compressed it. He hit the ground, rolled. When he rolled, his hands came into contact with the ground, ignited the manna. He flew into the air again, unleashing a fury of fiery attacks on his enemies below.

He landed behind their ranks, found himself in hand-to-manna-glowing-hand combat with them. Foxy was fighting on the other side, looking to kill them all by herself.

But these were some of the best mages in Tiger Kingdom.

"_Manna draco," _Kelly heard one mutter about a moment too late. The dragon's head was already wrapped around him. He chopped at it with a fiery hand, severing it from its owner. Nothing like the Fire's Fury dragons he'd faced on the Tiger Palace rooftop.

He spinned, throwing fire at the encroaching Tigers.

The last of them was cut down by a glowing hand to the throat performed by Foxy.

"Moving on!" She called and waved him in the correct direction.

Another set of seriously heavy-duty blast doors stood in their way. Another compressed ball of golden manna destroyed it.

Behind it waited _the _best mages in Tiger Kingdom. Just two of them. But that was enough to make Kelly shiver.


	8. Chapter VII

**As you may have noticed, I published another chapter in The Outsider: The Lost Chapters. Read it, guys!**

**Now, this chapter is incredibly short, I know. I wanted to tie up this story line and move on to the next one; it's big. I'm going to get chapter eight, which should be very long, out as soon as I can, after a new chapter of The Lost Chapters. **

**We're nearing the end of Burning Paper Tigers, folks. In more than one way.**

**So, without farther ado, the seventh chapter of Burning Paper Tigers.**

* * *

><p>Kelly and Foxy eyed the Tiger mages warily as they stepped through the shattered remains of the blast door.<p>

Kelly's enhanced eyes realized that they weren't two mages. In front of them was a mage and the King.

"Foxy, the one on the left..."

"Yeah, I know."

"I got him."

"I'll help you when I'm through with this clown," she grinned toothily, gesturing at the mage.

"Got it." Kelly took in a deep breath, looked at his surroundings. It was a high-vaulted room, filled with ornamental tapestries. The throne room. There wasn't much he could use to his advantage in here. Nothing but the manna in those fired brick walls. It would do. All four of them stood there, staring each other down. Kelly knew better than to charge the King, and the King knew better than to charge a user of Fire's Comfort, much less Comfort's Light.

Someone was going to have to make the first move, though. Might as well be Kelly. He didn't charge, but rather blasted fiery manna at the King.

He dodged, somehow captured that energy, sent it flying back at Kelly. It shouldn't have even been possible for a Kiedran to use the manna from Fire's Comfort. Kelly decided that it wasn't time to worry about that.

"_Ignis scutum!" _The firey shield formed. The firey manna impacted it, was deflected.

But then the King was above Kelly, hands filled with fire. The shield blocked one. The second shattered the shield. The third impacted Kelly's vest.

But Kelly then had a hold of the King's hand. He flung him to the floor, followed with a hand covered in hardened orange manna.

The hand impacted the ground, not the King. The floor shattered.

But there was another hand, wrapped around the top of Kelly's vest. Flinging him against a wall. That was painful. But the wall had something valuable. Manna.

The King was walking towards him, hands glowing blue. Kelly took in a deep breath. He grabbed the manna in the wall behind him, but not just the manna, the wall it was in, too. He pulled it out, flung it at the King.

With a wave of his hand, all the bricks were slammed to the ground.

This guy was good.

Kelly started throwing smaller blasts of manna, rapidly, at the King.

One or two impacted, small bursts of fire dissipated by a complex self-defense spell. Kelly summoned up a larger burst of manna. Dodged. The King began throwing blue discs of his own. Kelly rolled to dodge. He used the glowing manna as an extension of his arm, grabbed a table, flipped it, jumped behind it.

The blue discs impacted it. Kelly flung it. The King held a hand in front of him, split the table with it.

Kelly pulled his gun off his back, kneeled into firing position, fired a burst, enhancing each round with glowing, firey manna. _Dodge that, _Kelly thought.

The King tried to run, dodge. But Kelly could follow him, and the rounds moved faster than the speed of sound. No way to dodge that.

But the rounds that impacted didn't do much. They were slowly working their way through layers of spells and protective garments. Then, _click. _Kelly dropped the mag, grabbed another off his vest, rammed it in. Right as he was about to cock the bolt, he saw the King, reaching to slap him with a glowing hand. Kelly blocked with a orange manna-coated arm. The King's eyes rolled into the back of his head. He collapsed.

Foxy now stood in front of Kelly, smiling smugly, her hand losing a blue glow.

Kelly breathed a sigh of relief. "Well, that's that."

Foxy nodded, breathing heavily. "Yep."

Kelly looked around, "The mage?"

"Dead."

Kelly nodded. He put a finger to his comm stone as he stood up. "Eagleye, Scar, status."

There was a large explosion from somewhere far away in the compound. "Answer your question?" Eagleye's voice reported through the stone.

"Quite effectively. Make your way towards the exfil route."

"Got it."

While Kelly didn't want to say it over a comm. channel, their exfil would start in the King's motor pool. Kelly had four holographic discs, much like the ones The Great Lane had used when he arrived through the portal. Put together, the four produced their escape vehicle.

"Lead the way, Foxy."

Her eyes glowed blue with manna. The blue vanished. She grinned smugly, walked deeper into the King's chamber. She ran a glowing hand over the wall toward the back. She stopped at a spot, grinned again. The blue in her hand intensified. She sent a blast at the wall.

A door was blown back into a long concrete hallway.

"The King always has a good exit route. I guess he thought he was a match for us."

Kelly grinned. "He thought wrong." Examining the hallway and accepting that it held no fired manna, he ended Fire's Comfort.

Guns drawn, they moved rapidly down the hallway. It ended in another secret door in the side of the King's motorpool. Which, it seemed, was pretty heavily guarded.

The instant Foxy blasted down the door, they found themselves in a firefight. The only thing they had for cover was a armored limo of the King's. It worked.

Taking cover behind souped up Lane Industries Crown Victorias was a squadron of Tiger infantry. They were hosing Kelly and Foxy with a belt-fed maschinengewehr. Kelly couldn't draw any manna whatsoever from the concrete beneath his feet. It was a problem for both Humans and Unities. Foxy was running low on manna crystals and wanted to save them for the trip out, which was wise, but Kelly was beginning to think that they might need to use them anyhow.

Then the blast door on the other side of the hangar-like building gave way to C4. Eagleye and Scar wiped the Tigers out from behind.

"'Bout time y'all showed up," Kelly called out to them.

"Excuse us, we just had to make our way through most of the King's guard."

Kelly looked at Foxy, shrugged, "I'll let them off with it this time."

She laughed.

Kelly set the four holo disks on the ground. He pressed the button on the last one and stepped away.

Energy from within the disks was converted into matter as the car formed in front of them.

"Sweet ride," Scar said appreciatively.

"What is it?" Eagleye asked.

"It's a Unity-manufactured, modified version of the 2034 Ford GT from The Great Lane's world. It's been stretched so it can have four seats, the V8 has been replaced by a manna turbine. There's a minigun in the back window. The tops of the doors fold out so you can stand up and shoot. Now, before more of them get here, let's go."

They climbed in the vehicle, Kelly in the driver's seat, Scar manning the rear-facing minigun, Eagleye in the back and Foxy riding shotgun. Kelly pushed in the clutch, pressed the start button. He rammed the shifter into first, released the clutch. The car took off down the hangar-like floor. "Foxy, the door?"

Foxy folded the top of the door above her, stood up. A blue bolt blew the door out with a loud thud.

Off throttle. Clutch. Second gear. Off clutch. Throttle.

Off throttle. Clutch. Third. Clutch. Throttle.

Throttle. Clutch. Fourth. Clutch. Throttle.

"Tiger Crown Victorias behind us, gaining," Scar reported.

"What are we going?" Foxy exclaimed.

"70. 80. Speedo's in mph, mind you." Throttle, clutch, fifth, clutch, power. "90. 100. Still counting on your guidance, Foxy."

"Um... There's a left up ten kilometers ahead. About 140 degrees."

"Got it." Throttle, clutch, sixth, clutch, throttle.

"Didn't these things come with paddle shifters by default?" Eagleye asked.

"Yeah. Wanted a proper gearbox. I personally oversaw all the modifications."

There was that turn. Kelly threw the steering wheel to the right. Let the rear of the car kick out. He corrected, brought her back into line. She accelerated nicely. The turbine whined loudly. It was turning a few hundred thousand RPM, just above redline.

"Those Tigers are gaining on us."

"What _did_ they do to those Crown Vics to make them run like that? I'm at almost 200mph."

"They're not Crown Vics anymore, sir. We lost those a while ago. These are some kind of high end Tiger sportscars."

"Great. When's the next turn?"

"Eight kilometers. It's a 90 degree right turn."

"Good. Keep up with this one, fellas," Kelly muttered, grinning. He pressed a button on the steering wheel. There was a beep. "Play song: "You're Gonna Go Far, Kid," The Offspring."

Earth Music had flooded the market when USAF personnel has started selling it.

"_Show me how to lie_

_You're getting better all the time_

_And turning all against one_

_Is an art that's hard to teach,"_

This flood was mainly because Earth's music is _good._

There was the turn. Kelly grinned. Throttle, clutch, handbrake. He slung the steering wheel right, then rapidly back left. Handbrake, downshift, clutch, power, straighten steering wheel.

"_Take him out today_

_Nice work you did_

_You're gonna go far kid_

_With a thousand lies and a good disguise_

_Hit 'em right between the eyes_

_Hit 'em right between the eyes_

_When you walk away, nothing more to say_

_See the lightning in your eyes_

_See 'em running for their lives"_

"Where on _Mekkan_ did you learn to drive like that, Kelly?"

"I may or may not have been Unity Nation's top rally car driver before I joined the Air Force."

"That would do it."

Throttle, clutch, fifth, clutch, throttle.

The turbine roared.

Throttle, clutch, sixth, clutch, throttle.

"Any of them make that turn, Scar?"

"Two."

"How many of them were there to start with?"

"Three."

"Progress, I suppose," Kelly muttered. "Hit 'em when they get in range."

"Of course."

"When's the next turn?"

"Three kilometers. It's a yield, 115 degrees."

"_Now you lead the way_

_Show the lie today_

_Nice work you did_

_You're gonna go far kid_

_Trust and see_

_With a thousand lies and a good disguise_

_Hit 'em right between the eyes_

_Hit 'em right between the eyes_

_When you walk away, nothing more to say_

_See the lightning in your eyes_

_See 'em running for their lives_."

He drifted around the turn. "How far 'till we're in Unity turf?"

"About a sixty kilometers. Next ( and last) turn is four kilometers ahead. A right onto an exit ramp merging onto a highway-"

"-Which has no doubt been blocked."

"No doubt. I'll take care of it," Foxy said.

Kelly heard the minigun windup over the whining of the turbine. It fired loudly and rapidly. The shells were ejected into the car's slipstream, which left them miles behind in mere minutes.

The bullets were miles behind in mere seconds. Some landed in the grills of the Tiger sportscars. The things must have been reinforced though, the heavy rounds didn't seem to have much of an effect. Being part of the King's motorpool, though, it made sense for them to be heavily armored. Kelly considered telling Foxy to take care of them, but he knew that she couldn't have too many crystals left.

That said, he drifted onto the on ramp of the highway, merged onto it. The Tigers were right behind.

Ahead, however, were significantly more Tigers. A roadblock.

"Foxy!"

"On it!" She opened the top of the door, stood up. A blue hand blew a three meter gap in the roadblock. Kelly rocketed through it. The sportscars followed.

* * *

><p>Amber shot over Tiger territory, looking for a car very much out of place on this world; a 2034 Ford GT.<p>

There it was, a thousand meters below pursued by two cars that appeared to be of Tiger manufacture. She locked her systems on those two cars. Fired two Air-Ground Laser guided missiles.

* * *

><p>Suddenly, the Tiger cars just weren't there anymore. Kelly could only see two large explosions in the rear view mirror. A USAF F-32 shot overhead. That explained it. There was another explosion, farther off. Likely a roadblock being cleared.<p>

Within minutes, they were back in Unity territory.

General Lane waited for them. Kelly stopped, shut the car off. They all climbed out. Kelly grinned, shook the General's hand. "We did it, sir."

"Yes you did, son, yes you did."

A runner well, ran, up, handed the general a paper.

Lane cursed. Dropped it. "We need to get somewhere far away from here," he said, waving them to follow him.


	9. Chapter VIII

_Alright, folks, I'm sorry for the massive delay in the publication of even this short chapter. The girlfriend whom I shamelessly based and named Amber Finney after and I broke up. As it turns out, she'd had someone other than myself in mind for several months._

_So I Hemingway'd her. One last paper tiger to burn._

_Without final ado, the last chapter of Burning Paper Tigers. The ending isn't how I expected it, but I like it. The whole point of Burning Paper Tigers is summed up in this one chapter: no matter what we do, we'll all be paper tigers in the end._

* * *

><p>"Follow me," Joe said, waving towards the assembled squadron. They ran off after him. "The Tigers launched atomic missiles," he said as they made their way toward Nora.<p>

"Didn't we, you know, disable those?" the squadron's Bastian component asked. Joe forgot his name.

"Apparently not. They're coming from the Western Bastian territory, Arctic Wolf territory. The sea," Joe provided.

"Mobile sites and submarines. Clever, aren't they?" Youngston asked.

"Unfortunately," Joe muttered.

They all jumped onto Nora. She had to make her back slightly longer and her wings larger to accommodate all five of them.

Joe was working the comm. stone board before she was off the ground. He selected every channel, even civilian stations, set his special priority military override.

"To everyone who is listening, Tiger Kingdom is attacking with atomic missiles. Evacuate to the nearest bomb shelter. If you are in Lyn'Knol, try to get to the portal to Earth, the Great Lane's world. USAF personnel, return to base, get back to your world. This is your only warning."

Nora was now putting everything she had into each and every beat of her wings. Joe could feel the tension of air building up in front of her; she was nearing the speed of sound.

Lyn'Knol was less than a hundred miles from the forward base they had left. They were descending upon it within a minute. Nora swooped through an entrance to the underground USA governmental complex designed for her kind. She stopped haltingly. Everyone dismounted. Suddenly, rather than a large white dragon, they were faced with a small white cat. They all shrugged it off and started running through the complex. Joe knew where the portal was, the rest followed without a word.

They made it through the portal, which was already choked with evacuees, into Cheyenne Mountain Complex, a dismal grey-walled place. The Americans were being incredibly efficient at moving refugees through the portal and to the surface. Several thousand square miles around the complex had been restored to their pre-apocalyptic state by Unity mages. Looks like most of them were going to get used. Lyn'Knol's population was about a million, but Joe estimated that around half of them would use the city's bomb shelters. The other half would try to get through the portal. But time was running out. The Tiger subs had been close to the capital of the United Species Alliance. Joe found that Trace, along with his cabinet and most of the USA General Assembly, were through the portal. They had been among the first.

Joe found a USAF major. "Are you in contact with your personnel on the other side?" he asked the younger man.

"Yes. Everyone but two pilots are through."

Joe knew the worst instantly. Amber and her wingman had been covering Youngston's squadron's escape. Advanced Tiger fighters, prototypes, Joe understood, had tied them up right after the squadron had made it to the base Joe was on. The Tigers intended to tie them up until it was too late...

"What are they doing, sir?" the major asked him.

"Who?"

"The Tigers. The war is over; they lose. Why are they nuking you?"

"They're burning paper tigers, son. All of them. That's all we are. That's all any of us were. It's all any government, any person, has ever been. Any military. Paper tigers. We look so fierce. So dangerous. As it turns out, there's nothing to us. We claim to be there for the people, for their interests. We want to help. All we want is peace, right? So then, why must we wage war for peace?"

* * *

><p>Amber Finney looked at her radar. She was mere miles from base, but she wasn't going to make it. The Tiger missiles were almost to Lyn'Knol now.<p>

Suddenly, there was the impact. She'd seen nukes in China. This was different. There was a massive blue flash, and a blue mushroom cloud arose from the ground. And the shockwave was about to smack her F-35.

It flipped her end over end. There was no way to right the jet. Ejecting would only leave her at the mercy of the nuclear weapon.

She accepted her fate as she saw her wingman's plane fill her windscreen. Soon the ground would reach up and reclaim her for its own. _Dust to dust and ashes to ashes,_ she thought.

* * *

><p>Two gravestones were made in the complex's new cemetery. One had Amber's name. The other, her wingman's.<p>

A man, a pastor, came up, made a moving sermon. Next, her family came up and made moving speeches. And her boyfriend. _Wait, what? _Joe thought as the kid introduced himself. They'd been dating for a year, one month and eighteen days, he said. So she'd been cheating with Joe...

As it turned out, she'd been a paper tiger, too.


End file.
